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  • Maya Angelou Center for Hea...
    Caban‐Holt, Allison M; Starks, Takiyah D.; Lloyd, Shawnta'; Ford, Anita; McCall, Sole'; Eale, Samuela B.; Fuller, Lori; Byrd, Goldie S.

    Alzheimer's & dementia, December 2023, 2023-12-00, Letnik: 19, Številka: S19
    Journal Article

    Background African American (AA) caregivers of patients with Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and related disorders can play a critical role in maintaining patient health. The Maya Angelou Center for Health Equity at Wake Forest University School of Medicine Caregiver College (MC2) aims to (1) improve informal caregivers’ knowledge of AD and related disorders, (2) enhance the quality of life for AD patients and caregiver’s by providing awareness of and access to resources that can help reduce caregiver burden, (3) provide strategies to effectively manage patient symptoms associated with AD, and (4) fill gaps in culturally relevant health education and awareness on AD, brain health, and dementia caregiving skills for AAs. Method The 40‐hour inaugural session of MC2 was conducted in‐person in October 2022. Educational sessions were facilitated by experts in various fields including AD, social work, nursing, aging, nutrition, and pharmacy. Topics covered over the course of the educational week included: Alzheimer’s Disease Overview, Health Disparities in AAs, Risk Factors for AD, End of Life Planning, and Caregiver Health. The 21‐item Dementia Knowledge Assessment Tool (DKAT), version 2 (Toye, et al. 2013) was used to track changes in AD knowledge and awareness. A DKAT pre‐test was administered before the educational sessions began on Day 1, and a post‐test assessment was administered at the end of the last educational session on Day 5. Result Attendees (N = 21) are African American (100%), primarily female (90.48%), with an average age of 66.8 years (range 42‐82 years, 1 missing value). DKAT assessments from the week‐long educational training, showed an 8% increase in knowledge about AD in this sample of dementia caregivers based on a 5.7 percentage point increase on the DKAT from an average of 71.4% correct pre‐training to an average of 77.1% correct post‐training. Conclusion Findings suggest that community‐based educational training is a useful strategy for improving AD knowledge and resource awareness for AA informal caregivers. Results will be used to expand this training to include community members who will be engaged through presentations by attendees of the MC2.