Effectiveness of family stress-relief interventions for patients with dementia: A systematic evaluation of literature

Abstract

Objective: The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the effectiveness of stress-relief interventions for family members of patients with dementia. Data Source: This analysis includes peer-reviewed articles published between 1989 and 2019, selected from online databases. The introduced keywords were: stress reduction, dementia, or Alzheimer’s; program, therapy, intervention, or technique; caregivers. For the Selection of Studies: We utilized the following inclusion criteria: (1) studies with experimental or quasi-experimental design; (2) study samples that include adult caregivers, who take care of other family members diagnosed with various types of dementia; (3) testing one or more types of psychological inferences presented in the study has been conducted to reduce the stress of patients with dementia; (4) studies written in English and subjected to a peer-review process. Results: Stress-reduction interventions for patients with dementia appear to have had a statistically significant effect in most of the identified studies. Conclusion: On a qualitative level, the results show the effectiveness of both pre-test and follow-up interventions, but these results are to be regarded cautiously, considering the heterogeneity of the evaluation tools used and the small number of studies included.