Care and support of older adults with Alzheimer's and Dementia Continued Amidst COVID-19
By: Denise Lafferty, Chief Strategy & Operations Officer, MIND Center
When the COVID-19 pandemic reached Mississippi in March 2020, the MIND Center Clinic took immediate action to protect its most vulnerable patient population of older adults while continuing to provide critical dementia care and caregiver support services. With seven years’ experience in providing telemedicine services in collaboration with UMMC’s Center for Telehealth through the “TeleMIND” program, MIND Center Clinic providers quickly pivoted to an all-virtual approach to patient care delivery using mobile applications which enabled their senior patients to receive care from the safety of their homes.
As the disproportionate impact of COVID-19 on nursing home residents and staff became evident, Dr. Kim Tarver, Director of MIND Center Clinical Services, joined a team of providers at UMMC to lead an educational initiative for nursing homes in Mississippi called Project ECHO. It is estimated that a large number of local and regional long term care facilities’ residents and staff have died from COVID-19, representing nearly one-quarter of the nation’s known COVID-19 deaths. Nursing home residents are especially vulnerable due to their age, their underlying frailty, and their communal living conditions.
Supported by the federal Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, and in collaboration with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, Project ECHO launched a National Nursing Home COVID-19 Action Network in 2020 to recruit nursing homes around the country to join an interactive community of practice to collaboratively advance improvements in COVID-19 preparedness, safety, and infection control. The Lead Team at UMMC has been providing education and support to multiple cohorts of long term care facilities in both Mississippi and Alabama on a weekly basis. The initial training period is for 16 weeks with a potential extension of the project under consideration.
To continue providing support to families and patients with Alzheimer’s and dementia, which proved critical to combatting the isolation associated with the pandemic, The MIND Center continued its monthly Caregiver Support Group virtually and created a Caregiver Support Facebook Group to disseminate important information and caregiving tips during COVID-19. Through the “Mind Matters” series, multiple Community Education programs were delivered virtually via Facebook Live and Zoom on topics including: “Alzheimer’s and Dementia Caregiving During COVID-19”; “Fall Prevention for Older Adults”; “Palliative Care: Making Wise Decisions Along the Way”; “Highlighting the Correlation Between Diabetes and Cognitive Decline”; “Managing Uncertainty: The Caregiver Burden Behind the Curtain”; and “COVID Vaccine Myth-Busters”.
In response to an expressed need from caregivers of loved ones with Alzheimer’s and dementia for more in-depth training, The MIND Center launched a new training program called “Caregiver University” (CGU) in October 2020. CGU is a free, quarterly education program for family caregivers offering 18 sessions which are presented by experts from The MIND Center and other departments at UMMC as well as from health care partner organizations who provide dementia care and support services in Mississippi.
Faculty members drawn from the community outside UMMC represented such organizations as the Alzheimer's Association Mississippi Chapter, the School of Applied Sciences at the University of Mississippi, Itawamba Community College, and the Mississippi Gerontological Society. The next session of CGU is scheduled April 6 – 16, 2021. To learn more about CGU or to apply to attend a future session