Practitioners' identification of informal caregivers' difficulties with activities of daily living interventions for older people with dementia in Japan

Diabetes management in people living with dementia in Japan: a qualitative exploration

BACKGROUND

Dementia and diabetes are highly prevalent among the older society in Japan. People living with dementia (PLWD) often face hurdles in managing diabetes. This study explored the perspectives of healthcare providers in Japan regarding diabetes management in PLWD.

METHODS

We conducted a qualitative study using in-depth interviews as a data collection method. A total of 15 physicians and nurses were interviewed. A qualitative content analysis of the codes was performed to generate the themes.

RESULTS

The major themes focused on the management of medications/therapeutic regimen, difficulties of continuing health care, emotional aspects of PLWD for adherence to lifestyle modification, and varying direction and degree of family support for diabetes care.

CONCLUSION

PLWD in Japan face challenges in medication management, food restriction, and lifestyle modification. Policies to engage home visit care workers in medication management, consideration of the emotional aspect of PLWD, and utilisation of social support might help in the proper management of diabetes in PLWD.

The Impact of Mobile Phone Reminders on Perceived Self-Care Levels of Informal Caregivers

Informal caregivers play a fundamental role in caring for people that need assistance and provide an effective service in managing their loved ones’ health. Because of this, they have little time to attend to themselves and perform self-care practices. Some of these practices can improve mental health. By snowball sampling, we recruited 15 informal caregivers, 12 females and three males. Using the Wilcoxon signed-rank test, we analyzed the impact of the reminders on a self-care scale. We used the Mindful Self-Care Scale, comparing the same population without reminders and with reminders. Results indicated that total self-care scores with reminders increased statistically significantly, T = 13, Z = −2.481, p ≤ 0.013, with a large effect size (r = 0.64). This study shows a significant self-care increase in informal caregivers after using reminders. Future development of a reminders-based approach could focus on increasing self-care and the time caregivers take for themselves, empowering them to take a more active role in meeting their own needs.