Paper
Wednesday, July 11, 2007
Caregiving in the Cultural Context: Empowering Alzheimer's Caregivers among Rural Native Americans
Nancy Blume, PhD, RN, BC, ARNP-CNS, Graduate Nursing Studies, Lamar University, Beaumont, TX, USA
| Learning Objective #1: Explore a model of empowerment that links positive appraisal in Caregiving to cultural strengths. |
| Learning Objective #2: Describe Alzheimer's Caregiving within the cultural context of the Native American culture |
The purpose of this study was to empower at-home American Indian Caregivers of Alzheimer’s and Dementia persons. Empowerment was modeled on positive appraisal resources from personal and cultural strengths. Strengths identified among the study sample (n= 31) were compassion, finding meaning, coping skills and sense of coherence. The strengths model was developed through a path analytic approach that determined a goodness of fit statistic with a model that fitted the data (r squared, F test, p=.05). Significant paths were: P21 (.563) Compassion to Finding Meaning, P42 (.485) Finding Meaning to Sense of Coherence. Two rural Midwestern states provided access and training to American Indian Caregivers through their Cooperative Extension Divisions. Data were collected through a Cultural Heritage Strengths survey, Finding Meaning in Caregiving scale, Jaloweic Coping Inventory and Antonovsky’s Sense of Coherence scale. The data revealed a significant path that based caregiving strengths on cultural compassion for family members, identifying purpose through a higher being, “doing” for an honored other, and aspects of attributing respect. Empowerment was measured as a sense of coherence or making sense of the situation. Connecting with resources was also part of the caregiver training.