Dementia causes a progressive decline in mental and physical functioning. Therefore, it is important for people with dementia and family caregivers to engage in early conversations about planning for the future. A prerequisite for conversations about advance care planning is the willingness and ability of patients, caregivers, and healthcare professionals to engage in such conversations. However, a prerequisite for talking about advance care planning is that people with dementia, family caregivers and healthcare providers are willing and able to do so.
To increase this ‘readiness’, tools (i.e. conversation aids) have been developed to support people with dementia and family caregivers in preparing for advance care planning conversations. With this project, we aim to integrate these conversation aids systematically and effectively into the entire care chain for people with dementia.
The GEREED project aims to achieve the following:
- Increase the readiness of people with dementia, their family caregivers and healthcare professionals to engage in advance care planning conversations.
- Assess the use and costs of conversation aids to increase readiness in various stages of the disease.
- Understand how patients and family caregivers can be inspired to express what is important to them using conversation aids.
- Develop, implement, and evaluate an online training for healthcare professionals in primary, secondary and tertiary care settings, focusing on:
a. Increasing their own readiness, along with readiness of persons with dementia and their family caregivers.
b. Using conversation aids to initiate, conduct, and maintain advance care planning discussions. - Disseminate and implement the training and conversation aids in transmural care for individuals with dementia and their family caregivers.