Medicines management in people with Alzheimer's Disease v1.0
Research type
Research Study
Full title
How do people with Alzheimer's Disease, and their family carers, view and manage medicine-taking?
IRAS ID
200310
Contact name
Rosemary Lim
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Reading
Duration of Study in the UK
0 years, 11 months, 30 days
Research summary
How do people with Alzheimer’s Disease and their family carers, view and manage medicine-taking?
This study aims to explore and explain medication non-adherence experienced by people with Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). In the UK, there are more than 520 000 people diagnosed with AD. AD is a neurodegenerative condition that results in dementia, the chronic progressive impairment of cognitive brain function (e.g. thinking, reasoning, memory and decision-making).
A limited number of medicines are used to manage cognitive symptoms of AD. Some people with Alzheimer’s may also be prescribed medication for other health conditions they have. People with Alzheimer’s not only ‘forget’ to take their medicines, they may also have problems remembering ‘how’ to take their medicines. Recognising medicines and recalling dose instructions are also problems. However, these problems and how family carers support people with Alzheimer’s with medicine-taking in their own home, is under-researched and not well understood.
Several medication-related issues have been documented including non-adherence and medication errors but the depth of knowledge is incomplete. This study will investigate in-depth, the experiences, difficulties and coping strategies used by people with Alzheimer’s and their family carers to manage medicines-taking. In-depth understanding of issues relating to medicine-taking will provide important data for developing and testing potentially more effective support models in a larger study to prolong safe independent living for people with Alzheimer’s, improve patient experience and quality of life (QoL).
This study is funded by the Wellcome Trust charitable foundation and will run for one year. We will ask people with Alzheimer’s living in their own homes to tell us about their views of medicines and how they manage medicine-taking, facilitated by photographs that they will be asked to take for the study. We will ask family carers of people with Alzheimer’s to tell us about their views on medicines, medicine-taking and their role in helping manage medicines. We will be recruiting eligible participants from the Berkshire area.
REC name
London - Surrey Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/LO/1574
Date of REC Opinion
26 Sep 2016
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion