Faculty in the School of Aging Studies have been awarded $1.8 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH): National Institute on Aging to support their work of implementing and analyzing the impact of a palliative care education intervention for staff in assisted living facilities caring for people living with dementia.
Debra Dobbs, PhD, is the principal investigator on the project, and Lindsay Peterson, PhD, Hongdao Meng, MD, PhD, MPH, and William Haley, PhD, will serve as co-investigators. The team will also be collaborating with investigators from UNC-Chapel Hill, Miami University, Penn State, University of Iowa, Workforce & Quality Innovations, and community hospices from Chapters Health Systems and Empath Health.
After the four-week education program, the researchers will analyze quality-of-care outcomes and examine whether the education intervention impacts staff self-efficacy and perceived organizational support, therefore improving job satisfaction and commitment. The feasibility of collecting family satisfaction with care outcome data will also be tested. Initial funding is three years, with an additional two years of funding contingent on successful progress.