The ethical evaluation of assistive technology for practitioners: a checklist arising from a participatory study with people with dementia, family and professionals

2012 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Beatrice Godwin
Keyword(s):  
Assistive Technology ◽  
Ethical Dilemmas ◽  
Study Data ◽  
Dementia Care ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Ethical Evaluation ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
Monitoring And Surveillance ◽  
At Home

PurposeUncertainty over ethical impact may hinder uptake of assistive technology (AT) in dementia. This study aims to examine whether AT contributes to person‐centred care, whether users can participate in research and to explore ethical dilemmas with users, family and professional carers.Design/methodology/approachPeople with dementia, at home or in residential care, and carers were allocated equipment and consulted about ethics. In a small, qualitative study, data were collected using semi‐structured interviews and vignettes and content‐analysed to establish themes.FindingsAT in person‐centred dementia care requires meticulous assessment, reliability and availability in rapidly evolving situations. Users displayed insight, logic and empathy in ethical evaluation. They disliked remote monitoring and surveillance, whereas carers were pragmatic, prioritising safety.Research limitations/implicationsThis research provides further evidence that users with dementia can be included in research. It demonstrates a significant potential role for AT in dementia care, with an ethical checklist to help professionals evaluate ethical dilemmas.Originality/valueAT potentially increases wellbeing, enabling users to remain longer at home, delaying or avoiding moves to or between homes.

Improving well-being in dementia care for clients and carers

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 321-326
Author(s):  
Rhonda Riachi ◽  
Sally Markwell
Keyword(s):  
Qualitative Study ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Dementia Care ◽  
Theory Approach ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Beneficial Effects ◽  
Communication Techniques ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
Care Workers

Purpose This paper aims to highlight the results and emerging themes from a study concerning the effect of communication techniques that were tailored to each client in relation to the extent of their dementia. Dementia was viewed by the care workers primarily as a memory disability. Design/methodology/approach A short qualitative study of the communication techniques of care workers in England, who had received training in dementia care and some training in the SPECAL® method (Specialised Early Care for Alzheimer’s),was conducted through semi-structured interviews. Resulting data were analysed using a constructivist grounded theory approach. Findings Continued application of the SPECAL techniques appeared to reinforced clients’ sense of well-being and produced benefits for care workers’ own well-being. Research limitations/implications This small qualitative study suggests there can be beneficial effects for both clients and the care team when care workers tailor their communication behaviour to the needs of people with dementia. Further research on communication techniques in dementia care is needed and how these benefits might be translated into institutional settings. Originality/value Few research studies have been made of the SPECAL dementia care method, and this study was the first to look explicitly at the communication techniques that the care workers used with clients. Public health professionals are less likely to be aware of the SPECAL method.

scholarly journals Carers’ experience of using assistive technology for dementia care at home: a qualitative study

BMJ Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. e034460 ◽  
Author(s):  
Vimal Sriram ◽  
Crispin Jenkinson ◽  
Michele Peters
Keyword(s):  
Assistive Technology ◽  
Phenomenological Study ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Use Of Resources ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
Social Environmental ◽  
The Uk ◽  
Qualitative Phenomenological ◽  
Person With Dementia ◽  
At Home

ObjectiveAssistive technology (AT) can help carers (family, friends and neighbours) and people with dementia to stay well and safely at home. There are important gaps in what we know about experience of using AT from the perspective of carers of persons with dementia. This study investigates carers’ experience of using AT in supporting and caring for persons with dementia who live at home.DesignQualitative phenomenological study with semi-structured interviews to achieve data saturation and thematic analysis to identify key themes.SettingCommunity-based within the UK.ParticipantsTwenty-three (14 women, 9 men) adult carers of persons with dementia who have used at least one AT device.ResultsAll participants reported benefiting to varying degrees from using AT. There were 5 themes and 18 subthemes that highlighted reasons for using AT and use of AT over time. Providing care for a person with dementia, motivation for using AT, changes to roles and routines, carer knowledge and skills for using AT and social, environmental and ethical considerations were the main themes. This study showed that AT can provide reassurance and support for carers of persons with dementia but there are difficulties with acquiring and continued use of AT as dementia progresses.ConclusionsCarers consider AT as an adjunct to care they provided in caring for a person with dementia. Use of AT should be considered in the personal, social and environmental context of persons with dementia and their carers. Further research and policy interventions are needed to address best use of resources and guidance on data sharing and data protection while using AT.

Building a digital marketing internship program for technology-based start-ups: an exploratory study of student experiences

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
G. Russell Merz ◽  
Jamie Ward ◽  
Sufian Qrunfleh ◽  
Bud Gibson
Keyword(s):  
Factor Analysis ◽  
Language Processing ◽  
Exploratory Study ◽  
Study Data ◽  
Student Experiences ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Student Interns ◽  
Internship Programs ◽  
Blog Posts

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to describe the role and characteristics of the summer internship program (Digital Summer Clinic) delivered by Eastern Michigan University. The authors report the results of an exploratory study of interns participating in the Digital Summer Clinic over a five-year time period. The study captures and analyzes the experiences of interns as expressed in structured interviews and blog posts.Design/methodology/approachThe study data were text from structured interviews and blog posts capturing the “voice” of the interns. A natural language processing (NLP) analysis of the text corpus, consisting of 43 interviews and blog posts, resulted in the identification of 242 unique stem-terms used by interns in describing the internship experiences. The authors used the JMP Pro 15.2 Text Explorer algorithm (It is defined as a suite of computer programs for statistical analysis developed by the JMP business unit of SAS Institute) to extract the terms that were subsequently transformed and analyzed with factor analysis and regression to address the research questions.FindingsThe factor analysis results found six dimensions or themes, defined by the stem-terms used by student interns, best described the internship experience. The authors then explored the relationship between the six themes and the umbrella term “internship” with multiple regression analysis. The regression findings suggest a hierarchy of effects with the theme “Introducing Professional Opportunities” being the theme most predictive of the umbrella term.Originality/valueThe methodology used within the paper is unique in several ways when compared to other research investigating internship programs. First, it uses NLP analysis for the qualitative analysis of text-based descriptions of student experiences over a five-year time horizon. Second, the data analysis uses transformed text to quantitatively determine the major dimensions or themes expressed by the interns about their experiences in the Summer Clinic program. Finally, the relative importance of the themes identified provided direction for future program development.

Library services enriching community engagement for dementia care: The Tales & Travels Program at a Canadian Public Library as a case study

2021 ◽  
pp. 096100062110651
Author(s):  
Jiamin Dai ◽  
Joan C. Bartlett ◽  
Karyn Moffatt
Keyword(s):  
Public Libraries ◽  
Public Library ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Dementia Care ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Library Services ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Community Based ◽  
People With Dementia

Growing dementia-friendly library services are contributing to community-based dementia care. Emerging community programs in libraries and museums provide notable opportunities for promoting engagement and inclusivity, but these programs have yet to receive in-depth assessments and analyses to guide future research and practice. This paper presents a case study examining a social and storytelling program for people with dementia run by a Canadian public library. It investigates two research questions: How can public library programs contribute to community-based dementia care? And what are public libraries’ strengths and challenges in running programs for people with dementia? The study involves participant observations of the program and semi-structured interviews with people with dementia, caregivers, and program facilitators (librarians and Alzheimer Society coordinators). Through thematic analysis of fieldnotes and transcripts, the study reveals how this inclusive platform supports engagement, fosters relationships, helps caregivers, and reaches broader communities. This research further uncovers the librarians’ diversified roles as demonstrated through their collaboration with professionals, preparation and research, and facilitation of the sessions. This paper advances librarianship research on enriching community-based dementia care, including furthering inclusivity and engagement and extending accessible library services. By analyzing library programming for the dementia community and assessing its strengths and challenges, the paper highlights librarians’ awareness of the community’s evolving needs and their collaboration with other professionals. It offers practical insights on useful resources and emerging best practices that will hopefully inspire other initiatives in which information professionals can help improve the well-being of vulnerable populations.

Causes and mitigation for declining productivity in the Australian mid-rise residential construction sector

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (3) ◽  
pp. 253-266 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tillmann Böhme ◽  
Alberto Escribano ◽  
Emma Elizabeth Heffernan ◽  
Scott Beazley
Keyword(s):  
Supply Chain ◽  
Study Data ◽  
Residential Construction ◽  
Construction Sector ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Construction Productivity ◽  
Productivity Losses ◽  
Design Changes ◽  
Stage Process

Purpose The construction industry is a significant driver of economic activity in many countries. However, there has been a lack of growth in productivity within the Australian construction sector over recent years. The purpose of this paper is to gain an in-depth understanding of the causes for declining productivity within the Australian mid-rise residential construction network. Design/methodology/approach Two in-depth case studies have been conducted with a builder and developer, both significant entities of the Australian mid-rise residential construction network. Case study data collection comprised a five-stage process including semi-structured interviews and archival information review. Findings Drivers for declining construction productivity were identified under the categories of: industry-, firm- and project-level productivity. The drivers include: incomplete documentation, design changes, inefficient project management, supply chain fragmentation, among others. Originality/value The contribution of this study is the identification and categorisation of major issues impacting sector productivity along the mid-rise residential construction supply chain. The research identified that the substructure and superstructure are the construction phases during which most productivity losses occur. Mitigations are discussed in terms of systemic sector productivity increases at an industry, firm and project levels.

scholarly journals Personalisation, customisation and bricolage: how people with dementia and their families make assistive technology work for them

2018 ◽  
Vol 39 (11) ◽  
pp. 2502-2519 ◽  
Author(s):  
Grant Gibson ◽  
Claire Dickinson ◽  
Katie Brittain ◽  
Louise Robinson
Keyword(s):  
Technology Use ◽  
Dementia Care ◽  
Assistive Technologies ◽  
Everyday Practice ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Manage Care ◽  
Age In Place ◽  
Care Services ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
The Everyday

AbstractAssistive technologies (ATs) are being ‘mainstreamed’ within dementia care, where they are promoted as enabling people with dementia to age in place alongside delivering greater efficiencies in care. AT provision focuses upon standardised solutions, with little known about how ATs are used by people with dementia and their carers within everyday practice. This paper explores how people with dementia and carers use technologies in order to manage care. Findings are reported from qualitative semi-structured interviews with 13 people with dementia and 26 family carers. Readily available household technologies were used in conjunction with and instead of AT to address diverse needs, replicating AT functions when doing so. Successful technology use was characterised by ‘bricolage’ or the non-conventional use of tools or methods to address local needs. Carers drove AT use by engaging creatively with both assistive and everyday technologies, however, carers were not routinely supported in their creative engagements with technology by statutory health or social care services, making bricolage a potentially frustrating and wasteful process. Bricolage provides a useful framework to understand how technologies are used in the everyday practice of dementia care, and how technology use can be supported within care. Rather than implementing standardised AT solutions, AT services and AT design in future should focus on how technologies can support more personalised, adaptive forms of care.

scholarly journals Differences in assistive technology installed for people with dementia living at home who have wandering and safety risks

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleanor Curnow ◽  
Robert Rush ◽  
Sylwia Gorska ◽  
Kirsty Forsyth
Keyword(s):  
Assistive Technology ◽  
Selection Process ◽  
Living Situation ◽  
Caregiver Support ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
Multiple Characteristics ◽  
Person Characteristics ◽  
Person With Dementia ◽  
The Impact ◽  
At Home

Abstract Background Assistive Technology for people with dementia living at home is not meeting their care needs. Reasons for this may be due to limited understanding of variation in multiple characteristics of people with dementia including their safety and wandering risks, and how these affect their assistive technology requirements. This study therefore aimed to explore the possibility of grouping people with dementia according to data describing multiple person characteristics. Then to investigate the relationships between these groupings and installed Assistive Technology interventions. Methods Partitioning Around Medoids cluster analysis was used to determine participant groupings based upon secondary data which described the person characteristics of 451 people with dementia with Assistive Technology needs. Relationships between installed Assistive Technology and participant groupings were then examined. Results Two robust clustering solutions were identified within the person characteristics data. Relationships between the clustering solutions and installed Assistive Technology data indicate the utility of this method for exploring the impact of multiple characteristics on Assistive technology installations. Living situation and caregiver support influence installation of assistive technology more strongly than level of risk or cognitive impairment. People with dementia living alone received different AT from those living with others. Conclusions Results suggest that caregiver support and the living situation of the person with dementia influence the type and frequency of installed Assistive Technology. Reasons for this include the needs of the caregiver themselves, the caregiver view of the participants’ needs, caregiver response to alerts, and the caregiver contribution to the assistive technology assessment and selection process. Selection processes should be refined to account for the needs and views of both caregivers and people with dementia. This will require additional assessor training, and the development of validated assessments for people with dementia who have additional impairments. Policies should support the development of services which provide a wider range of AT to facilitate interventions which are focused on the needs of the person with dementia.

Impact of a dementia-specific program of equine-assisted activities: providers’ perspectives

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 37-47
Author(s):  
Beth Fields ◽  
Wendy Wood ◽  
Rebecca Lassell
Keyword(s):  
Service Providers ◽  
Institutional Care ◽  
Complex Interventions ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
People With Dementia ◽  
Person With Dementia ◽  
Equine Assisted

Purpose Establishing acceptability of complex interventions to stakeholders is vital in early scientific development. The purpose of this paper is to ascertain the acceptability of a program of equine-assisted activities (EAAP) for people with dementia by elucidating programmatic practices needed to enhance their safety and quality of life (QoL) from the perspectives of service providers. Design/methodology/approach Semi-structured interviews with five providers were analyzed using a basic qualitative approach. Findings Providers perceived the EAAP as acceptable and revealed potential mechanisms of change supporting well-being, including aspects related to the physical and social environment and person with dementia. Linkages identified among the EAAP and its physical and social context support its complexity. Providers explicated program practices that promoted safety and QoL, such as implementing staff trainings and tailoring activities to each person’s preferences and needs. These practices aligned with best dementia care approaches, underscoring that the EAAP is a promising complex intervention that merits further scientific development. Originality/value This work is novel and adds to the literature by illuminating the role of a community-based, animal-assisted program for enhancing the QoL of older adults with dementia residing in institutional care facilities.

Sustainable HRM: toward addressing diverse employee roles

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Nataliya Podgorodnichenko ◽  
Adeel Akmal ◽  
Fiona Edgar ◽  
Andrè M. Everett
Keyword(s):  
Human Resource ◽  
Holistic Approach ◽  
Study Data ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Hr Practices ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Hr Managers ◽  
Levels Of Integration

PurposeThe purpose of this empirical study is to develop an understanding of how human resource (HR) managers employed by organizations with an explicit sustainability agenda view employees as stakeholders, and to explore how such views are operationalized in HR policies and practices.Design/methodology/approachAn interpretive approach using data from 35 semi-structured interviews was adopted for this study. Data were transcribed and analyzed using the Gioia methodology.FindingsComparison of approaches to sustainable human resource management (HRM) revealed three distinctive conceptualizations of employees with respect to the sustainability agenda – employees as a driving force for sustainability, employees as consumers of HR practices and employees as members of a community. Strong levels of integration between the HRM and sustainability agendas were only evidenced in those organizations where an attempt had been made to address all three roles simultaneously. Findings suggest that engagement with a sustainability agenda widens the remit of the HRM function, underscoring the importance of employees' roles as consumers of HR practices and as members of wider communities.Practical implicationsBy addressing the integration of HRM with a sustainability agenda, this article helps practitioners recognize diversity among employees' roles and the varying associated needs. Examples of policy and practice initiatives that effectively address these needs are provided.Originality/valueHRM has been widely criticized for overemphasizing shareholder value, thereby lacking in attention to the needs of other stakeholders, including employees. Findings from this study suggest the holistic approach advocated by a sustainability agenda can effectively quell these concerns.

Working with older people with dementia: motivations and demotivations among health carers

2019 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 117-126
Author(s):  
Sara Cheloni ◽  
Anthea Tinker
Keyword(s):  
Healthcare Professionals ◽  
Hospital Setting ◽  
Personal Characteristics ◽  
Intention To Leave ◽  
Working Environment ◽  
Staff Retention ◽  
Structured Interviews ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Staff Motivation ◽  
People With Dementia

Purpose Motivation is central to the ongoing professional development, performance and retention of healthcare workers. Despite the increasing prevalence of people with dementia (PwD) and the associated demand for geriatric nurses, there exists a paradoxical shortage. The purpose of this paper is to explore the motivation and demotivation of healthcare professionals for working with older PwD, challenges faced, factors influencing intention to leave the field of work and methods to enhance staff motivation to continue working with this group. Design/methodology/approach This grounded-theory study used thematic analysis to synthesise data from 13 semi-structured interviews relating to the motivating and demotivating factors of healthcare professionals (nurses and healthcare assistants) for working with older PwD in a hospital setting. Findings Staff were motivated by previous personal experiences, personal characteristics and the fulfilment of the carer–patient relationship. Conversely, staff were mostly demotivated by organisational and working environment factors (e.g. poor leadership characteristics, inadequate staffing levels, lack of development opportunities), negatively influencing their intention to remain in employment. Research limitations/implications The generalisability of the results is limited by the size of the sample. Different organisational strategies/interventions (i.e. support, training, recognition and rewards) are necessary to nurture staff motivation, improve retention, create positive working environments and enhance patient care. Originality/value This study offers numerous ways in which to address factors contributing to demotivation in working with PwD, thereby helping to improve staff retention and support the needs of a growing population.

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