Support groups for family caregivers of persons with dementia in India

Abstract

A caregiver support group was initiated at the Schizophrenia Research Foundation, Chennai, India. The study aimed to evaluate this service for 100 caregivers of persons with dementia, identify the needs met and explore the facilitating factors and barriers for participation. The support group met the information, emotional and counselling needs of caregivers. Trust between members was a key facilitating factor. Lack of help at home to support the person with dementia, distance from the venue and work commitments were barriers to caregiver participation. The study found that support groups fulfil an important need for caregivers by providing information and peer support.

Dementia care landscape in Nepal: Understanding the context, barriers, and opportunities for the development of a national dementia care plan

“…Similarly, formal caregivers in OAHs often lack skills in recognizing and managing the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia. Interventions aimed at developing communication skills, stress management, and dealing with difficult situations should be provided to formal caregivers 92 …”

Does the Nae Umeed group intervention improve mental health and social participation? A pre–post study in Uttarakhand, India

“…Specific evidence for effectiveness of group caregiver interventions exists for high-income settings (Sörensen et al, 2002 ; Cheng and Zhang, 2020 ; Hovadick et al, 2021 ; McLoughlin, 2022 ), but is limited in the South Asian context. Studies of group interventions for family caregivers of persons with schizophrenia (Sims et al, 2022 ) and dementia (Lamech et al, 2020 ; Stoner et al, 2022 ) in India have been described but did not include measures of effectiveness. In the only published study (to our knowledge) quantitatively assessing effectiveness of a group caregiver intervention in India, a support group intervention was associated with increased family system strength scores in rural caregivers of stroke patients (Malini, 2015 ).…”

“…Evidence from low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) is relatively scarce (Hinton et al, 2019 ; Gabriel et al, 2020 ). Within India, a variety of interventions have been trialled at small scale and with mixed results (Das et al, 2006 ; Dias et al, 2008 ; Kulhara et al, 2009 ; Chakraborty et al, 2014 ; Chatterjee et al, 2014 ; Lamech et al, 2020 ; Baruah et al, 2021 ; Singh et al, 2021 ; Sims et al, 2022 ; Stoner et al, 2022 ).…”

“…On the other hand, group interventions may exacerbate existing inequalities with more educated participants engaging more effectively (Hoddinott et al, 2010 ). In India, several group interventions for caregivers have been implemented with reasonable feasibility and acceptability (Lamech et al, 2020 ; Sims et al, 2022 ; Stoner et al, 2022 ), although evidence for effectiveness is limited (Malini, 2015 ). There is an urgent need for cost-effective, equitable and sustainable interventions to strengthen caregiver mental health in LMICs.…”

Scaling a group intervention to promote caregiver mental health in Uttarakhand, India: A mixed-methods implementation study

“…Globally, mostly in high- and middle-income settings, a variety of interventions to improve caregiver mental health have been developed (Sörensen et al, 2002; Hinton et al, 2019), however, these may be of limited utility in lower resource settings. In India, a few interventions have been trialled in single health services or districts (Das et al, 2006; Dias et al, 2008; Kulhara et al, 2009; Chakraborty et al, 2014; Chatterjee et al, 2014; Lamech et al, 2020; Baruah et al, 2021; Singh et al, 2021; Sims et al, 2022; Stoner et al, 2022), but have not been implemented at scale. Scaling-up of interventions in LMICs has been identified as a gap in implementation research (Meffert et al, 2016; Alonge et al, 2019).…”