TY - JOUR
T1 - COVID-19 Crisis Effects on Caregiver Distress in Neurocognitive Disorder
AU - Alexopoulos, Panagiotis
AU - Soldatos, Rigas
AU - Kontogianni, Evangelia
AU - Frouda, Maria
AU - Loanna Aligianni, Souzana
AU - Skondra, Maria
AU - Passa, Maria
AU - Konstantopoulou, Georgia
AU - Stamouli, Evangelia
AU - Katirtzoglou, Evgenia
AU - Politis, Anastasios
AU - Economou, Polychronis
AU - Alexaki, Maria
AU - Siarkos, Kostas
AU - Politis, Antonios
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021-IOS Press. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021
Y1 - 2021
N2 - Background: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have mental health implications for both people with neurocognitive disorder and their caregivers. Objective: The study aimed to shed light on relations between caregiver mental reaction to the pandemic and caregiver distress related to neuropsychiatric symptoms, memory impairment progression, and functional impairment of people with neurocognitive disorder during the period of confinement in Greece. Methods: The study included caregivers of patients with mild (N = 13) and major (N = 54) neurocognitive disorder. The caregiver-based telephone interview was based on items of the neuropsychiatric inventory questionnaire, the AD8 Dementia Screening Instrument, and the Bristol Activities of Daily Living Scale. Regarding the mental impact of the COVID-19 crisis on caregivers, four single questions referring to their worries in the last seven days were posed, in addition to the scales Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-Item (GAD-7) and the 22-item Impact of Event Scale-revised (IES-R). A stepwise linear regression model was employed for studying the relationship between caregiver distress and demographic and clinical data and caregiver mental reaction to COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. Results: Caregiver distress severity during the confinement period was influenced not only by memory deficits (p = 0.009) and neuropsychiatric symptoms (p < 0.001) of patients, but also by caregiver hyperarousal (p = 0.003) and avoidance symptoms (p = 0.033) and worries directly linked to the COVID-19 crisis (p = 0.022). Conclusion: These observations provide further evidence for the urgent need for support of caregivers of patients with neurocognitive disorder during the COVID-19 pandemic.
AB - Background: The outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have mental health implications for both people with neurocognitive disorder and their caregivers. Objective: The study aimed to shed light on relations between caregiver mental reaction to the pandemic and caregiver distress related to neuropsychiatric symptoms, memory impairment progression, and functional impairment of people with neurocognitive disorder during the period of confinement in Greece. Methods: The study included caregivers of patients with mild (N = 13) and major (N = 54) neurocognitive disorder. The caregiver-based telephone interview was based on items of the neuropsychiatric inventory questionnaire, the AD8 Dementia Screening Instrument, and the Bristol Activities of Daily Living Scale. Regarding the mental impact of the COVID-19 crisis on caregivers, four single questions referring to their worries in the last seven days were posed, in addition to the scales Generalized Anxiety Disorder 7-Item (GAD-7) and the 22-item Impact of Event Scale-revised (IES-R). A stepwise linear regression model was employed for studying the relationship between caregiver distress and demographic and clinical data and caregiver mental reaction to COVID-19 pandemic outbreak. Results: Caregiver distress severity during the confinement period was influenced not only by memory deficits (p = 0.009) and neuropsychiatric symptoms (p < 0.001) of patients, but also by caregiver hyperarousal (p = 0.003) and avoidance symptoms (p = 0.033) and worries directly linked to the COVID-19 crisis (p = 0.022). Conclusion: These observations provide further evidence for the urgent need for support of caregivers of patients with neurocognitive disorder during the COVID-19 pandemic.
KW - COVID-19
KW - Confinement
KW - impairment in activities of daily living
KW - memory deficits
KW - neuropsychiatric symptoms
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U2 - 10.3233/JAD-200991
DO - 10.3233/JAD-200991
M3 - Article
C2 - 33185608
AN - SCOPUS:85099029353
SN - 1387-2877
VL - 79
SP - 459
EP - 466
JO - Journal of Alzheimer's Disease
JF - Journal of Alzheimer's Disease
IS - 1
ER -