April 23, 2025 • 43 mins
When caregiving for someone with dementia, the most powerful support might not be what you expect. Dr. Beth Fauth, director of Utah State University's Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia Research Center, reveals transformative approaches to dementia care that benefit both caregivers and their loved ones.
What began as an unexpected passion during her college studies has evolved into groundbreaking research on caregiver support. Dr. Fauth shares how her multidisciplinary approach—drawing from psychology, healthcare, family studies, and even architecture—creates a more comprehensive understanding of dementia caregiving challenges. "Understanding the mechanism of how something works is valuable," she explains, "but what I really want to do is find ways to help this population."
The conversation dives deep into practical interventions that meet caregivers where they are. Traditional support often requires caregivers to attend in-person sessions—adding another burden to their already overwhelming responsibilities. Dr. Fauth's innovative online, self-guided therapeutic programs allow caregivers to access evidence-based support at any hour, without leaving home. These digital interventions apply Acceptance and Commitment Therapy principles, teaching caregivers to acknowledge difficult emotions while acting in alignment with their personal values.
Perhaps most moving is Dr. Fauth's perspective on finding joy amid dementia's challenges. Rather than constantly correcting a loved one with dementia, she suggests embracing their reality—much like improvisational theater. This simple shift creates genuine moments of connection and reduces unnecessary conflict. "We can't bring them back to where we are in the present moment," she notes. "Our only option is to jump in, join their reality, and go with it."
From emerging medical treatments to growing collaboration between researchers and service providers, Dr. Fauth offers hope for the future of dementia care. Whether you're caring for someone with dementia or working in healthcare, this conversation provides essential insights for navigating the dementia journey with compassion, resilience, and even moments of unexpected joy.
• Started in dementia care through work in assisted living and discovered her passion during an adult development class in college
• Transitioned from studying caregiver stress mechanisms to developing practical interventions that reach people who need support
• Founded Utah's Alzheimer's Disease and Dementia Research Center in 2022 to bridge research and community service
• Developed online self-guided Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) interventions for caregivers
• Found that the care environment significantly impacts the progression of dementia
• Emphasizes the importance of acknowledging difficult emotions while still acting in alignment with personal values
• Advocates for "joining" the reality of the person with dementia rather than correcting them
• Excited about emerging trends in Alzheimer's treatments targeting amyloid, tau, and inflammation
• Highlights growing collaboration between researchers, service providers, and policymakers
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Welcome back to Senior Care Academy, a help me
podcast.
I'm your host, caleb, and todaywe have an incredible expert
joining us.
Dr Beth Fouts, a professor andthe director of the Alzheimer's
Disease and Dementia ResearchCenter at Utah State University,
focuses on the well-being offamily caregivers, the
transition into late life,assistance and how social
(00:30):
support impacts mental health.
She has developed thepsychoeducational and
therapy-based interventions tohelp caregivers manage stress
and improve their quality oflife while caring for their
loved one.
In this episode, we'll exploreher research, the realities of
dementia care and the practicalstrategies for caregivers.
Whether you're a familycaregiver, a healthcare
professional or someone that ispassionate about aging well,
this conversation is packed withvaluable insights.
(00:50):
Dr Fouth Beth I don't knowwhich one to call you I'm
excited to have you on thepodcast.
Thanks for-.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah, you can call me Beth.
I'm happy to be a Beth.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Okay, sweet, my little sister is Elizabeth, but
we call her Lizard sometimes.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
I won't get into my nicknames.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Okay, cool, we'll just call you Beth.
Could you start by sharing whatinitially drew you into the
field of human development andfamily studies and then, after
that, what motivated youspecifically to focus on
dementia care and caregivingwithin kind of your research?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I didn't have a direct line.
I kind of found this passion,this career, in unexpected ways
I guess.
So when I went to college Ireally thought I wanted to be a
physician.
I love healthcare, I likeclinical practice.
I'd shadowed some physicians.
Overall I was sort of committedthat that's the path I was
(01:47):
going to go and I took a um, alot of psychology classes and I
kept finding myself completelyin love with all my psych
classes and just kind ofdrudging through the chemistry
and organic chemistry and likejust not finding the love quite
so much.
(02:11):
So, right when I was about readyto pull together some of my
applications, I took a classcalled adult development and
aging.
So it was specificallydevelopmental psychology
focusing on late life, and I hada little bit of an epiphany, I
think, in this class I went backto earlier in high school.
I worked at assisted living andI absolutely loved the
residents with dementia.
Like I could come home and justtell stories and stories and
(02:33):
stories about funny things thatthey said and and ways that we
had to kind of improvise to getsomebody to not try to leave the
facility, try, ways that wetried to make things fun and I
just like I 'd never reallythought about it as a career.
And so that class in collegejust all of a sudden opened this
door Like I could do health,but I could do this within a
(02:55):
psychology lens or adevelopmental psychology lens,
and I could do it focusing ondementia.
So I kind of rapidly scrappedall my med school applications
and started looking for gradprograms in this area, and from
there I'm just kind of neverlooked back.
It's a great fit for me.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, so in that class, what were some of the
things that you studied thatreally piqued your interest
about later life development andthings like that?
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Very specific to dementia, so I liked the class
in general.
In fact, I teach this class atUtah.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
State.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
University.
But the dementia componentsjust kept reminding me of how
much I love the population and,to be honest with you, they
showed a video in that classthat I would never show my
students now because it wasbrutal on how difficult
caregiving can be.
I mean, I was crying in classLike it was, it just struck a
chord with me and I, you know, Ithought, man, like people with
(03:51):
dementia deserve, you know,better care because in some
cases there was neglect and thecaregivers were.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Did you have a history of caring for somebody,
or it just struck a chordbecause you're just so
passionate?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
No, not directly my grandmother that assisted living
facility that we worked, that Iworked at um.
My grandmother had Parkinson'sand did have some Parkinson's
related dementia and we hadmoved her from Washington DC to
that facility.
So you know I did, I did seesome decline in her but because
that she was getting most of hercare from um you know the
(04:22):
direct care providers and I washer know waitress and I'd come
in and visit with her.
So I didn't have the familycaregiving direct at home
experience.
I did see my mom struggling.
She had, you know me, heryoungest was still in high
school, her mom she was visitingregularly in the assisted
living.
So you know I did see a glimpseof it, but it was really more.
When I saw this video video tooI was like that can't be
(04:45):
accurate, that it's that bad.
And it turns out, it's really, Imean, that was a very unusual
focus, for I mean really onlyfocused on worst case scenarios.
So I've kind of since learned,you know, a lot of caregivers
really do go through challenges,significant challenges.
That's my passion.
But a lot of them have a greatexperience too.
I mean, they love, they lovecaring for their loved ones.
(05:05):
So, yeah, it's not all bad, butit was the scare tactic of that
video that really got me to sayI'm.
This is what I'm going to do.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
I'm going to go with this population in the class of
like I don't know that I want totouch this and you're like
that's messed up.
I should fix it if I can.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
That's cool of you.
So how would you say yourbackground, because you said you
got really into kind of thepsychology and human development
.
How has that influenced yourapproach to dementia care and
studying it?
Compared to, I think, a lot ofpeople in the dementia care
space and research, they comemore from the medical side,
whether it's a nurse or aphysician, versus a psychology
(05:48):
side.
What would you say is differentfor you and your approach?
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Yeah, so human development and family studies
is sort of a brand ofdevelopmental psychology, so you
can kind of use some of theminterchangeably, although the
family sciences piece isembedded more within my
department.
The interesting thing aboutthis field is that it's, by
definition, multidisciplinary.
So you're getting you'regetting a lot of psychology
(06:14):
theory, but you're also gettingsociology, nursing, there's lots
of, you know, geriatricmedicine.
So it's perfect for me becauseit's a combination of all the
fields and that's really how Ithink about problems.
I don't want to come at asituation or studying something
from a totally like cognitivepsychology, lens or experimental
(06:37):
psychology, which has thesesort of rules about how you
study something, and they'revalid, they're helpful.
But I always think of thingsbroader, as like well, you know
why, let's say, for caregivingfor somebody with dementia at
home, maybe it is the medicalpiece that's really the
challenge, but maybe it's thefamily conflict that you have
with your siblings becausethey're not helping, or maybe
(06:57):
it's the behavioral symptoms ofthe person that you're caring
for.
So you know, the sort ofcomplexity of how to look at
caregiving is just sort ofnaturally requires an
interdisciplinary perspective,and I think that's where my
training comes in.
It was like if you're notfinding what you're looking for
in a developmental psychologyjournal, you go to a nursing
(07:17):
journal and you look at.
You know you can find thingsreally in unique fields that are
really relevant to caregiving.
So I mean, sometimes some ofthe work I'm looking at is, like
you know, economics-based orlike how to design an
age-friendly community tosupport people living at home.
So sometimes it's architectureLike it's a combination of like
(07:40):
how to help people live wellwith this condition, looking at
it from all perspectives.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Yeah, and I like that .
I think it's the way to getsome of the best solutions is to
say like they are in this onephase of life.
But there's all of these otherthings that support to the
architecture of the house thatthey live in, to the family
relationships, to what it doesfor the rest of their body
physically, which brings inmedical, and so that's a good
(08:06):
approach, I think.
Are there any, or could youdiscuss any, milestones or
turning points that havehappened since that scare tactic
class?
That has kind of been a turningpoint in your career and shaped
your current research approachfrom I want to get into dementia
and study it to what you'respecifically researching now.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Yeah, I've had some really awesome things happen.
I mean, I was trained by afantastic dementia caregiver
researcher, probably one of thebest in the world, steve Zaret.
He's still a mentor for me, sohe's helped.
I mean, I think that was my.
The luckiest thing in the worldwas starting by working with
him.
But some of the things that Idefinitely have seen a
transition for my own work isthat really early on I was using
(08:50):
a very sort of data-drivenapproach.
We would go collect data youknow or use secondary existing
data sets and I kept sort oftrying to study, like how things
work.
And I did that for a long timeand I felt like that was really
valuable.
But I started interfacing.
Actually, when I moved to Utah,I started interfacing with like
service providers and peoplethat work with the Alzheimer's
(09:13):
Association and people at theDepartment of Health and I
started realizing like theresearch that I'm doing is
really it's okay, but it's notgetting to the people that need
it.
It's like understanding themechanism of how something works
is valuable because it's notgetting to the people that need
it.
It's like understanding themechanism of how something works
is valuable because it helpsyou build a better intervention
to make things better, but Istarted transitioning more into
like what I really want to do isfind ways to help this
(09:36):
population.
I want to talk to theseindividuals.
I want to hear what are theyworried about?
What do they want me to study,essentially?
So I really switched.
I would say, yeah, after movingto Utah.
The first five years I was here,I really started choosing
different projects to work on,focusing much more on
interventions and how to helppeople who are already in the
(09:58):
situation.
And then a major, majormilestone, which was 2022, I
worked with Dan Johnson, who's arepresentative in the district
here covering Cache Valley, theUtah House of Representatives,
and I worked with theAlzheimer's Association Utah
Chapter, the Department ofHealth, and we worked with the
(10:21):
state legislature to securefunding for Utah's Alzheimer's
disease and dementia researchcenter.
So, totally unexpected twist inmy career, I was not thinking I
was going to direct a researchcenter, although I absolutely
love doing that.
But this is where I think, allof a sudden, these 20 years of
work that I've been doing on,you know, understanding how to
(10:41):
help a caregiver, understandingwhat their stress looks like,
building an intervention thatcan help them and then now I'm
in a situation where I get towork with partners across the
state, try to get you knowpresentations, education, these
supportive services out to thepublic.
Like that was really thecatalyst, like having the center
(11:03):
, and now that's a huge part ofmy role is not just to do the
behind the scenes research butto say we have this research, so
everybody, I want you to hearabout it and that's been a major
change and also just absolutelyincredible part of my day.
You know, my day, my week, mymonth was I get to let people
know.
You know you're not alone.
Here's some great resources.
(11:25):
We have amazing partners in thestate.
We're trying to reach peoplewho don't know we exist.
You know, we're trying to helppeople in rural areas where they
don't have a lot of existingformal support networks, and so
that's been a really like all ofa sudden I get to braid all
these different parts of myexpertise together and now I'm
(11:45):
feeling like, okay, now it'sactually it's helping people.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Yeah, it's super cool and interesting.
Like you said, data, researchon processes and machines and
all these things.
The data is great Cause it'lltell you hey, you just have to
tweak this bolt a little bitright here and the machine will
run better.
But all of the research thatyou're doing, that, therefore,
what is like I have to changebehavior of tons of people and
it's so much more difficult todo that.
(12:10):
And it's cool to be able toactually be in a seat now where
you're like I have all this data, I've done all the research and
now let's impact people with it, rather than just like let's
put it on a shelf but it's like,oh, look at that cute data that
I found.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Right, Like getting a publication isn't as exciting
to me anymore as doing apresentation to the community.
Where I get to that, you knowthe information from that
publication actually gets intothe ears of people who are
living with this on a dailybasis.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And they can one feel , I think, heard and validated.
Then, two, you're giving sometools to their tool belt of like
.
Data says this if you do this,it'll help.
Your research examines kind ofthe stress and well-being of the
family caregivers and for theindividuals with dementia.
What are some of the thingsthat you found in this specific
(12:57):
area of like for the familycaregivers as they're helping
the people with dementia?
I'm curious on the impact thatthat has with for the individual
living with dementia.
So like I imagine a familycaregiver that is like a 10 out
of 10 stress, 10 out of 10, likeburnt out, all those things
probably does have a negativeimpact, uh, effect or an adverse
(13:21):
effect on the individual withdementia, compared to somebody
that has all these resources andis stressful.
You know it's still a three,four or five, but I imagine that
has a better outcome and didyou find anything like that as
people?
So I think caregivers alwaysput themselves in the back seat
and then, but it probably hasactually worse effects on their
loved one.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Yeah.
So we, you know, very early on,kind of back when I was still
studying more of this basicresearch not intervention
research there was a lot ofinteresting stuff that was
coming out of a large data setbased in Cache County called the
Cache County Study of Memoryand Aging, and we were finding a
lot of different analyses thatwere showing that the care
environment impacts theprogression of dementia.
(14:03):
So like there's a lot ofdifferent analyses that were
showing that the careenvironment impacts the
progression of dementia.
So like there there's a lot ofdifferent ways to unpack that Um
.
But you know, providing like acognitively stimulating
environment seemed to have aprotective role.
Early on in dementia Peopledeclined a little bit slower Um,
having a lot of emotionalsupport from the, the caregiver,
feeling like this relationshipwas a close one, was helpful for
(14:26):
the person with dementia.
So really early on again,before we got into intervention
work, we knew that the careenvironment mattered for both
the caregiver and for the personwith dementia.
Some of the things that I'veyou know, that I've learned as
we've worked on differentinterventions, tested them to
see if they work.
I think the first and mostimportant thing is that most
(14:49):
caregivers do not know thatthere are interventions
available.
So there's this sort ofrealistic thing that we live
with in caregiver research,which is that caregivers, by
definition, they're goingthrough a lot and it's really
hard to take on one more thing,so it's often they
don't know that they're goingthrough a lot and it's really
hard to take on one more thing.
So it's often they don't knowthat they're available or if
they do know, they're like Ijust don't have time, which is
(15:10):
understandable and I'm veryempathetic to that.
I think you know, I thinkdesigning an intervention that
requires them to drive and comein for an hour and find somebody
to supervise their loved oneyou know I've done research on
those and those interventionswork.
But I think that you know I'vedone research on those and those
interventions work.
But I think that you know, overtime I started feeling again
much more practical about how dowe reach a population that they
have a hard time driving andyou know we can't necessarily
(15:31):
get them to drive from a ruralarea to Logan or to Salt Lake or
St George or something.
So it's like we have to reallystart to pivot what we're doing
to fit their life and not havethem like sign up for our
studies and we deliver them theway we think they should be
delivered.
So so the transition that I'vetaken with my own work and
really passionate about is totry to build some of these
(15:54):
interventions to be online andself-guided, so you don't need
to pay for a therapist.
You can do it at four o'clockin the afternoon or 4am If
you're awake.
You can do it whenever you want, and so those.
The exciting piece for me isthat those kinds of online
interventions I mean we werestill sort of in this early
stage of like we know they workfor other populations, will they
(16:15):
work for dementia caregivers?
And so far the two studies thatwe've done on this particular
kind of intervention has shownthat yeah, online self-guided,
as long as caregivers sort ofknow it's there and they sign up
.
The other thing too is theywould if they were to drop out
of our studies.
It was after they said, yeah,I'll sign up for this research
study, and before they actuallystarted the intervention, right,
(16:37):
it was like again thatoverwhelming of like, yeah, I'll
work out, I'll do that, andthen you just don't do it.
So we found that once peoplestarted the online modules, they
stuck with it, and so that hasbeen just really, again kind of
helpful for them.
But also, like from aresearcher's perspective, just
so exciting that if you can getin-person help, if you have
(17:00):
access to a therapist,absolutely use human beings.
Like you know, there's nothingbetter than having a
conversation where you feel thatyou've been heard.
But if you don't have access tothat or that's difficult, then
there's, it's not like thenthere's nothing available.
There's there's these onlinesupportive services that help
the caregiver manage theirstress better.
(17:20):
So we're not making the stressgo away.
That's not the point.
That's we can't make it go away.
So we're just trying to helppeople live with that better.
And through these, the way thatwe assess whether the
interventions work is we do sortof these let's get it, measure
your depressive symptoms, youranxiety symptoms and see if
those improved.
But we also interview and weask questions about you know,
(17:41):
how did you apply it?
When did it help?
And some of the responses werereally great.
It was like I found that, youknow, when my mom was just
repeating the same question overand over and over again, which
is, you know, distressing for alot of people.
Even if you're a patient person, you know we see that they're
reporting, that they'reresponding to that better.
They're like living with thatbetter.
(18:04):
One person has said somethinginteresting.
I remember that she used to Ithink this was a she too she
used to leave the room when herhusband was being really
disruptive, like she justcouldn't handle it.
And then, through theseinterventions and sort of
learning how to live withdifficult situations, learning
that avoidance isn't always thehealthiest for yourself, you
know, she started thinking likehe's in distress, like this is,
(18:26):
I'm his caregiver and I, youknow, by me walking out of the
room, that's not actually likewhat I want to do.
I think of myself as a helpfulperson, and so she just changed
her approach to care.
So I think that those are thekinds of things that you know we
(18:48):
want caregivers to know is that, like, by managing their own
stress, they're going to bebetter for themselves, but also
they're going to be providingcare in a way that's probably
more like in alignment with howthey want to be instead of
stressed out and worried and youknow all legitimate feelings
for sure.
We don't want to say don't beworried and don't be stressed.
We just want people tounderstand that you can be
worried and stressed and stillprovide really great, you know
quality care.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Yeah, I love that.
I think, beth, that was areally great idea.
To be like hey, let's makesomething virtual, to the point
of going to the gym.
Example, like I'm going to workout, and then it's like wait,
actually I don't want to get upat six or 5.00 AM.
Just like how there's onlineresources that like kind of
getting a taste right, likeversus I need to drive, carve
out time, find somebody to comewatch my spouse or my grandma or
(19:30):
my mom, um, it's like I can dothis at four and if it's
valuable for spending a littlebit of time online, very low.
It's like oh, there's, I think,that an actual in-person
intervention and bringing people.
It's like meeting them wherethey're at.
It's kind of a first level forthem to start to experience
everything.
And I also liked how you talkedabout how do they want to show
(19:53):
up?
Because nobody.
I feel this is a broad brush.
I feel like caregivers don'twant to be brash or impatient or
whatever, like they want to beloving and their whole life
right, if it's their mom orwhatever, they've been a loving
daughter and dah, dah, dah, dahdah.
But it's difficult, it's beingable to step back and say I'm a
(20:14):
loving daughter.
She's in distress, just like Iwas.
As you said that I was thinkingabout.
I have a three-year-old son.
We just moved.
He was lashing out and stuff.
My wife, understandably soafter a long day, was a little
bit impatient.
I'm like this is a lot for him.
He's not lashing out because ofwhatever it's like there's
change, his life is disrupted,all these things.
So it's the same.
It's just a different kind ofdynamic because it's for an
(20:37):
elderly loved one.
One of the interventions thatI'd love for you to talk a
little bit more about you talkeda little bit, I think, on it,
but it's the acceptance and thenthe commitment therapy
interventions that you'vedeveloped with dementia
caregivers.
I'd love for you to talk aboutthat and kind of their
effectiveness.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yeah, so this is yeah , this is my passion project
right now.
So if you picked the right oneto discuss because if you picked
a different one I'd be like, no, can we talk about the other
one yeah, so ACT has been aroundfor a while decades it's
actually being used veryconsistently in in-person
therapy, so I can't take creditfor this approach.
(21:15):
It's been around and reallywell studied.
There's like over a thousanddifferent studies that are like
the most robust sciencerandomized control trial studies
where that shows thatacceptance and commitment
therapy works across manydifferent populations.
So we happen to be lucky enoughto have two plus experts at USU
that are this is their area isacceptance and commitment
(21:37):
therapy.
I've heard them.
I heard them on how thismechanism works and instantly I
thought this we got to do thiswith dementia caregivers.
Like this is a perfect type ofapproach because, scientifically
validated, it is based incognitive behavioral therapy, so
everyone's pretty comfortablewith that as like an accepted
form of therapy.
(21:58):
Yeah, um, and then there's somecomponents of ACT that are
really important, but the bestpart was that these researchers
have adapted it to an onlineformat.
So they had done all the hardwork of figuring out whether
this could be done in an onlineformat, and then they were
gracious enough to collaboratewith me so that we could say,
all right, now let's take theseonline formats, let's adapt them
(22:20):
for dementia caregivers so thatthey relate to the topic.
They see some of their stressembedded in these examples.
We're prompting them withthings that are kind of
caregiver specific.
So that all started reallyaround 2017, where that marriage
between dementia caregivinginterventions and ACT online ACT
(22:41):
kind of came together here atUSU and there are other places
in the world, actually, thathave done the same thing.
There's some other online ACTprograms, but okay, so let's
talk a little bit about why thiswas.
Just I felt like so passionateabout this being a great fit.
So you know, a lot of thecaregiver interventions that I
had been familiar with were likeokay, your loved one is asking
(23:05):
questions repeatedly, they'rewandering, they might be
aggressive.
So a lot of it was looking atthe symptoms of the person with
dementia and trying to help them, like trying to say, well,
what's confusing for them, youknow, kind of let's adapt the
environment so it's lessstressful for them.
So a lot of it was kind ofabout let's try to reduce their
(23:27):
symptoms, and sometimes that'seffective.
Of course, if you can make abetter environment for somebody
where they're not distressed,that's great.
Start there.
But there's just so much withdementia that you cannot control
, you can't, you know, askpolitely for them to stop asking
the question over and overagain.
I mean, they're just, they havebrain damage.
So I think it felt to me like Ididn't want the burden of
(23:49):
change to be on the person withdementia.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
They don't have to do better to make the caregiver's
life easier, right, it's just,it's sort of setting people up
for it's challenging, Especiallyas dementia progresses right
Like I might work early on, butover the years, months, years,
it's a different challenge everyfew months, you know, and so
it's a lot of moving parts andthe piece about acceptance and
commitment therapy is that it isconsidered what they call a
(24:28):
trans-diagnostic approach, whichis a fancy word for saying it
works for a lot of problems.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
It helps with depressive symptoms, it helps
with anxiety symptoms, helpswith grief and, as I'm talking,
you know add more.
You know sort of mental healthissues or concerns onto that
list and that's where I feltlike you know sort of mental
health issues or concerns ontothat list and that's where I
felt like you know somecaregivers are so anxious.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
I mean, that's their, you know, that's their reaction
.
Yeah, without this, withoutdimension in their life, they're
anxious.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
And then others are going through intense grief and,
as I mentioned, others are likethe caregiving situation's fine
, my work life has just gone outthe window or my social
relationships have been failing.
So it just felt like caregivershave their own, like they have
their own needs that are unique.
It's not like one interventionfits all.
Like if you give anintervention on, like well,
(25:18):
let's build up your socialsupport network Super important
to do that but like maybe socialsupport isn't what they're
worried about, maybe they'reworried about grief and loss.
So ACT is just because it'sreally focused on whatever your
issue is, let's work on.
That is kind of how it works.
So, again, if it's anxietysymptoms, if it's conflict, if
it's, et cetera, grief, it'steaching people to say, like
(25:43):
most of us, when we say let'ssay grief is a good example,
you're, you're grieving the lossof this person who's right in
front of you, but therelationship has changed.
And a lot of times when thosefeelings of grief will pop up,
we we really try to avoid them.
We just say like I don't wantto go there, I'm going to
distract myself, or I'm going tojust be happy, happy, happy, or
I'm going to binge watch, youknow, seven episodes of Netflix,
(26:06):
like we do this thing wherewe're like I don't want to feel
that way, so we avoid that.
And ACT is about starting tobecome more comfortable with
like letting those feelings showup and actually eventually
getting to the part, to theplace where you might even be,
not just like okay with thembeing there, but like kind of
curious, like I wonder why likewhy is today?
Speaker 1 (26:28):
why am?
Speaker 2 (26:28):
I feeling such grief today.
So first step is just kind ofgiving yourself compassion and
permission to feel the prettystrong emotions that we tend to
do our best to like run awayfrom and then and then the
second piece, which is reallyimportant, is to sort of do
things the way you want to dothem anyway.
(26:48):
So if you are somebody that,there's a really great exercise
that we do in our interventionwhere we say, like, pick a
characteristic that you think isreally like you love when you
do it, you love when you see itin other people.
So you know things like peoplethat are patient or
compassionate or whatever, pickyour flavor, joyful, and you
pick one of those.
(27:09):
You're just like, yeah, likejoyful, like I, just like I like
when I'm joyful, I like whenother people are joyful, and you
start to think about all youreveryday activities that you're
doing, including caregiving.
How do you do them joyfully?
So it's like I can be sad and Ican have grief and anger, but I
can also.
I like, I like joyful.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
I can, I can try to be anyways, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
So it's like kind of feel, feeling what you're
feeling.
But then you know againcompassion, how can I, how can I
be a compassionate caregiver,how can I be a patient caregiver
?
And it's not to say you have todo all these things perfectly
like, oh yeah, all thesewonderful characteristics,
figure out how to do them.
You pick one and you just tryto integrate it into your daily
activities as much as you can,and sometimes that's enough to
(27:54):
like just get yourself to kindof check, like am I really going
to yell at this person and belike you already asked that
question?
Or you're going to say wait aminute, compassionately.
Compassion, like how am I goingto say this differently?
You just feel better about yourresponse when you do it in a
way that's aligned with your ownvalues.
And then there's also someimportant sort of mindfulness
(28:19):
and meditation type pieces ofagain, when we're distressed,
we're usually really reactive,right, so we're in the moment.
These emotions are gettingbigger and bigger and bigger,
and just a lot of like focusingon the present and deep
breathing and those kinds ofthings that deescalate your
physiological reactivity to thesituation so that you can like
(28:40):
have enough like brain space tosay, all right, now that I've
breathed.
How is it that I want torespond to this scenario?
Because that's kind of where wetend to go off base, right?
It's like we all behave exactlyhow we want to behave when
there's no stress in our lives.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Like oh yeah, we're compassionate.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
We're joyful, like yeah, when there's no stress,
easy peasy, right.
But then as soon as we'restressed, that's when we start
to say I'm going off the rails,I'm getting impatient, I'm
getting, you know, I'm behavingin ways that I don't like.
So then we feel guilt when webehave in ways we don't like.
So now we're adding guilt ontop of the anger, like it's.
So this is a little bit of asnowball of like.
(29:16):
If we just pause and we sayanger is allowed to be there,
frustration is allowed to bethere, let's not snowball this
into anything bigger than it is.
Take a deep breath and thenlet's try to behave in a way
that's aligned with how we wantto behave.
So you know, it doesn't take aton of steps to sort of set this
up for caregivers.
In our interventions we havesome prompts and you know what's
(29:37):
an emotion that you're, thatyou struggle with, and here's
some things you might be doing.
Pick one and they kind of linkup together and they have some
practice exercises.
So I mean acceptance andcommitment therapy is.
There's so many resources freeonline.
You can Google stuff, you cango on YouTube really awesome
little clips on like oh yeah, Iguess I do you know I do that
(29:58):
and I could work on that.
So so this is why I think youknow again, this isn't it's.
I didn't recreate somethingthat wasn't already there.
I think what we did was we tooksomething that was working
really well in other populationsand we said let's help people
who are in a very distressingsituation that they can't get
out of.
Uh, let's help them live withit a little better.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Yeah, I love that.
I think, like you said, it's,it's taking something and
applying it to a population thatI think gets overlooked.
Just as much as people withdementia get overlooked, those
caring for them get it even moreso maybe.
And so helping them, givingthem some tools, like a pause to
reenergize, like just breatheand I like to the point of
(30:44):
acknowledging the emotion andthen showing up how you like to
anyways, I think is moreempowering than just not
acknowledging the emotion andforcing yourself to show up
joyfully the best you can,because that's shoving it down
and then eventually you're goingto blow up, versus just saying
like I am so frustrated rightnow, with the 80th time that
she's asked me that question, itseems like in the last two
(31:05):
minutes, um, somehow, and it'sjust like that's really
frustrating, but how can I re-on?
So I think that that's I reallylove, um, act, acceptance and
commitment therapy.
I think it's a great tool thatretrofitting it to this
population was a great, a greatstep in the right direction.
Um, you talked about joy.
(31:26):
This is we're already at 31minutes, which is insane to me.
But speaking of joy, and maybewe'll end on this, you did a
TEDx talk called Finding Joy inAlzheimer's Reality and you
discussed finding the joy amidstthe challenges that come with
Alzheimer's.
I would love for you to kind ofelaborate on that perspective
(31:46):
as you.
How can people find joy throughAlzheimer's?
Speaker 2 (31:51):
Yeah, yeah.
So it's like you know a lot oftimes, especially in earlier
stages of of any kind ofdementia but sometimes it
progresses even even longer.
Where you know as somebody is,you know, asking questions
repeatedly or they're mixingsomething up, that's, you know,
important.
Their caregivers are correctingthem right, and you know in the
(32:11):
very beginning maybe there'snothing wrong with that.
The person, if the person withdementia, is like, oh thanks,
sorry, I messed that person'sname up or I can't remember what
we did five minutes ago.
Fine, you can go ahead and, youknow, give them the information.
But as things progress, wesometimes see this kind of
incompatibility.
That's happening where a personwith dementia is, you know,
talking about like, oh, thisweekend we're going to get in
(32:34):
the car, we're going to go toIdaho, right, and the caregiver
is like, we're not going toIdaho, you can't even drive
anymore, like, and so there'sthis battle.
I think about like what's thereality?
And it's really common, right,I mean, it's like, it's not,
it's understandable that ithappens, but there's a lot of
like challenge in that approach.
And so the joyful part comeswhere.
(32:55):
I mean, I've heard there's someimprov comedians that have done
a lot on this, where treatingdementia like improv, like
they're going to throw you aline and it makes no sense
whatsoever and you're just goingto throw something back and and
the thing about is it makes itlight and it makes it fun.
And so if you just start saying, like, where are we going to
Idaho?
Um, you know, and they startdiscussing something and you're
(33:18):
like, well, what do you want toeat?
Should we pack, you know, doyou want to pack hamburgers or
whatever it is.
You just go with this.
You know in reality you're notgoing to Idaho, but like it's
still a really nice conversationthat you've had with somebody,
and so you have to be kind offluid and sometimes it gets you
feel silly.
But you know, I thinkcorrecting people nobody likes
(33:38):
to be corrected all the time andwe have to understand that
their reality is the reality.
Like we can't change that.
We can't bring them back towhere we are in the present
moment and get them tounderstand.
You know exactly how it is thatthings truly are.
So our only option is to jumpin, join their whatever it is
and go with it.
(33:58):
And it is hard.
You kind of have to like improvalmost you have to train
yourself a little bit to do that.
You kind of have to like improvalmost you have to train
yourself a little bit to do that.
But what I've you know what Ifound when I go into assisted
living or memory care I don'tknow individuals, like I don't
have a meaningful relationshipwith these individuals.
I'm just walking in but rightaway you know saying hello,
doing a little dance.
You know telling somebody my.
You know your hair is gorgeous,or I love that sweater on you
(34:22):
and and they are like wow, likethat was really, really nice.
And so you can say that.
You know, if they approach youfive minutes later, you can tell
them again like that's abeautiful sweater, I really like
that.
And then once again you seethem kind of light up.
And so there is this like thingthat we can do to train
ourselves that like it's we canbring the joy to like if we let
(34:46):
them know.
You know, this is a good day,I'm a good person, I'm in a good
mood.
Whatever you say, we can banterback and forth in a way that's
not combative.
We end up finding more kind ofjoyful moments in the exchange.
We're not going to get them toour reality, but we can still
have fun with it.
And I think too, you know to becautionary, to not like the
whole laughing at them, right.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah.
People with dementia can feelthat too, that they're, that,
they're that end of the joke.
They're not in it, right?
Yeah, it's not.
Yeah, it's laughing with themand just kind of going with it.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
That's actually what I loved about that job in the
assisted living way back when Iwas 16 years old was like I
don't, I have no trading, I haveno idea what I'm doing, but
this person thinks they're at ahotel and let's just go with it.
Let's go get some towels and,you know, take them to this
beautiful room that, uh, anyway,so it was sort of a something I
learned on the fly, but, um,yeah, something I think that we
(35:37):
can all, we can all do better atat bringing those sort of
moments of joy to people withdementia.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Yeah, one of my favorite stories oh, I can't
remember it was.
One of our guests came on,talked about going into a memory
care and there were these foursweet ladies sitting around a
table, laughing, having the timeof their life.
And she walked over and likeeavesdropped for a minute.
They were all having 0% relatedconversations.
They were just like talkingdifferently but they were just
(36:05):
having the time of their life,even though none of it connected
.
Somebody was like talking abouttheir trip to Hawaii whenever
that happened, and somebody elsewas talking about her dog that
day and everybody was just likelaughing.
So I think that going in andenjoying the time, you know,
creating a joyful moment for forthem, even though the the grand
(36:25):
scheme, maybe it's not joyful,but you can make joyful moments
all throughout it, so I lovethat.
Um last two, last two questionswhat trends or emerging trends
in dementia care do you dementiacare research, uh, do you see
and are most excited about?
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Well, I mean, first and foremost, we are, we as in
collectively.
Research as a whole is makingheadway in some treatments for
Alzheimer's.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Still slow.
The last person we had ontalked about there was something
out there that helps get the.
Oh, what is it in your brain?
Speaker 2 (37:00):
The beta amyloid.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I was like wow, that's insane.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
Yeah.
So I mean, I think that thosekinds of things are exciting and
and, um, you know I'm on theboard for the Alzheimer's
association in Utah.
We get updates on on researchall the time and when you look
at the numbers of studies thatare going on right now some of
them looking at amyloid, somelooking at another protein
called tau, some looking atinflammation we're really really
(37:25):
thinking of this differently,as a disease that you know
there's a lot of issues going onin the brain.
We're not going to solve itwith, you know, probably not
going to solve it by, like,finding the one medication.
So I think that that, to me, isa really exciting time because
at least you know, for the firsttime in my career, when people
say, do you think there's goingto be a cure or a treatment, I
(37:46):
say yes, I think there's goingto be treatment that is going to
slow the progression of thisdisease.
We're already there a littlebit and I think there's a lot of
funding that's being pivotedtowards Alzheimer's research
right now, which is great.
So that's the most excitingthing.
That's not my world ofcaregiver research, but as a
whole.
(38:07):
I would love to talk myself tohave a job right To say we don't
, I don't have to studyAlzheimer's anymore.
Um, you know it's not going tohappen overnight, but we're, but
we're getting there, and so Ithink that hope is important.
Um, and so, yeah, the othertrends I would say too would be
and these are also, I think,really valuable.
We're seeing this is more of aconnection between, like, policy
(38:30):
and research.
There used to be, I felt, astrong sort of barrier almost of
again what's happening in theresearch world, what's happening
in the services world, kind oflike, well, they don't
understand us and we don'tunderstand them.
And now I think there's a lotmore like we all got to work
together here.
You know there's not as muchfunding.
We all have to share ourresources, and so I think that
(38:54):
that trend is actually fantasticbecause it's helping
researchers understand you knowhow can you fit your research
into public policy, or you knowpolicy like, if you're going to
spend money on an intervention,why don't you do it on one that
has, you know, some empiricalvalidation that it's a good,
that it's a good intervention?
So I think there's a reallypromising trend where the work
(39:16):
that's being done in these sortof different silos is now
blending together much healthierrelationships between research,
like service providers, andpolicy.
It's a.
It's kind of a, it's anoptimistic time for me.
I mean, I go to these meetingsand you can see nobody's
fighting over territory.
They're just like no, what doyou got?
Okay, I'll help you.
(39:37):
Let's go get this out to my.
You know, can you go do somelobbyist work?
Like there's just a morehealthy connection between
everybody that wants to work onyou know, in this area that's
awesome.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
I think that those are awesome.
Really exciting trend, reallyexciting things to come to pass
over the next however long,whether it's 40 years or four
years, like it's it's cool tosee that there's it's getting
more focus and maybe it's by thetime I'm 80, it won't be
something that's so scary, youknow.
(40:09):
Last question what advice wouldyou offer to new researchers
that are entering the field ofdementia and caregiver studies?
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Yeah, I think you know.
Again I would say, make thoseconnections very similar to my
last answer of like my, the mostexciting things in my career
came from you know.
Again I would say, make thoseconnections very similar to my
last answer of like my, the mostexciting things in my career
came from.
You know I sat at meetings for10 years with the Department of
Health and you know there wasn'tfunding coming in for research,
but I saw the utility in likethe work that they were doing
(40:40):
and so being a partner with themfor a long time without, let's
say, personal like gain, like Iwasn't getting funding, I wasn't
even necessarily getting a lotof participants for my research,
but like that was one of themost valuable things I invested
in was like if you want yourwork to have impact, you have to
find the organizations that areable to, you know, put your
(41:04):
work forward or like our workreally not my work, but like all
of us and so networking piececan be time consuming and as
researchers, you know there's alot of grind.
There's like write the grantsdo the analysis, put the papers
out.
So of course, all that has tohappen, that's our metric,
that's how we, you know, we sortof get our work out there.
(41:25):
But I think that there isimportance in the personal
connections of your community.
So, connecting with serviceproviders, go in and talk to the
assisted living facilities, goin and talk to the you know
Department of Health or theAlzheimer's Association and
build relationships, because,again, it's like this teamwork
approach is making things moveforward so much faster than I
(41:48):
could have done without those,you know, without those
relationships, and so I thinkit's just been a really, it's
been a win-win for our state,even like.
We've gotten recognized as astate for working really well
together with theseorganizations, even without
funding to support that.
So, yeah, I would say there's alot of like.
You're the researcher brain isabsolutely necessary and you
(42:13):
know you got to.
You have to develop that.
But there is this piece of like, the.
So what?
Like?
Don't do it for the sake of amanuscript, do it for the sake
of like, who might benefit fromit directly.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Yeah, I like that.
Have a long-term perspectiverather than let's get a
manuscript published and whatnot.
It's like how do we make changeover the next decade?
Well, Dr Beth Fouth, it's beena lot of fun talking to you.
I can't recommend enough foranybody working in dementia or
with a caregiver of a client ora family member with dementia go
(42:48):
listen to your TEDx talk aboutfinding joy in an Alzheimer's
reality and then just all theresearch that you're doing.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
I appreciate the work that you that you're doing and
giving some time to myself andthe listeners, so yeah, and then
I'll just mention if anybody'scurious about anything I talked
about, they can come to ourwebsite too.
It's adrcusuedu.
We've got resources on a clinicthat we offer for free
(43:14):
telehealth and in person.
We've got research studies thatwe're recruiting for.
They can just connect with me.
I can direct them to morespecific things.
So yeah, just anybody listening.
If they want to reach out, I'mhappy to receive an email or or
just connecting on the websiteAwesome adrcusuedu.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Yeah, awesome, okay, well, beth, thank you so much.
I'm excited to publish this.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Yeah, thanks, gail.
Appreciate all you're doing.
Welcome back to Senior Care Academy, a help me
podcast.
I'm your host, caleb, and todaywe have an incredible expert
joining us.
Dr Beth Fouts, a professor andthe director of the Alzheimer's
Disease and Dementia ResearchCenter at Utah State University,
focuses on the well-being offamily caregivers, the
transition into late life,assistance and how social
(00:30):
support impacts mental health.
She has developed thepsychoeducational and
therapy-based interventions tohelp caregivers manage stress
and improve their quality oflife while caring for their
loved one.
In this episode, we'll exploreher research, the realities of
dementia care and the practicalstrategies for caregivers.
Whether you're a familycaregiver, a healthcare
professional or someone that ispassionate about aging well,
this conversation is packed withvaluable insights.
(00:50):
Dr Fouth Beth I don't knowwhich one to call you I'm
excited to have you on thepodcast.
Thanks for-.
Speaker 2 (00:56):
Yeah, you can call me Beth.
I'm happy to be a Beth.
Speaker 1 (00:59):
Okay, sweet, my little sister is Elizabeth, but
we call her Lizard sometimes.
Speaker 2 (01:06):
I won't get into my nicknames.
Speaker 1 (01:07):
Okay, cool, we'll just call you Beth.
Could you start by sharing whatinitially drew you into the
field of human development andfamily studies and then, after
that, what motivated youspecifically to focus on
dementia care and caregivingwithin kind of your research?
Speaker 2 (01:24):
Yeah, that's a good question.
I didn't have a direct line.
I kind of found this passion,this career, in unexpected ways
I guess.
So when I went to college Ireally thought I wanted to be a
physician.
I love healthcare, I likeclinical practice.
I'd shadowed some physicians.
Overall I was sort of committedthat that's the path I was
(01:47):
going to go and I took a um, alot of psychology classes and I
kept finding myself completelyin love with all my psych
classes and just kind ofdrudging through the chemistry
and organic chemistry and likejust not finding the love quite
so much.
(02:11):
So, right when I was about readyto pull together some of my
applications, I took a classcalled adult development and
aging.
So it was specificallydevelopmental psychology
focusing on late life, and I hada little bit of an epiphany, I
think, in this class I went backto earlier in high school.
I worked at assisted living andI absolutely loved the
residents with dementia.
Like I could come home and justtell stories and stories and
(02:33):
stories about funny things thatthey said and and ways that we
had to kind of improvise to getsomebody to not try to leave the
facility, try, ways that wetried to make things fun and I
just like I 'd never reallythought about it as a career.
And so that class in collegejust all of a sudden opened this
door Like I could do health,but I could do this within a
(02:55):
psychology lens or adevelopmental psychology lens,
and I could do it focusing ondementia.
So I kind of rapidly scrappedall my med school applications
and started looking for gradprograms in this area, and from
there I'm just kind of neverlooked back.
It's a great fit for me.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, so in that class, what were some of the
things that you studied thatreally piqued your interest
about later life development andthings like that?
Speaker 2 (03:24):
Very specific to dementia, so I liked the class
in general.
In fact, I teach this class atUtah.
Speaker 1 (03:28):
State.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
University.
But the dementia componentsjust kept reminding me of how
much I love the population and,to be honest with you, they
showed a video in that classthat I would never show my
students now because it wasbrutal on how difficult
caregiving can be.
I mean, I was crying in classLike it was, it just struck a
chord with me and I, you know, Ithought, man, like people with
(03:51):
dementia deserve, you know,better care because in some
cases there was neglect and thecaregivers were.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Did you have a history of caring for somebody,
or it just struck a chordbecause you're just so
passionate?
Speaker 2 (04:01):
No, not directly my grandmother that assisted living
facility that we worked, that Iworked at um.
My grandmother had Parkinson'sand did have some Parkinson's
related dementia and we hadmoved her from Washington DC to
that facility.
So you know I did, I did seesome decline in her but because
that she was getting most of hercare from um you know the
(04:22):
direct care providers and I washer know waitress and I'd come
in and visit with her.
So I didn't have the familycaregiving direct at home
experience.
I did see my mom struggling.
She had, you know me, heryoungest was still in high
school, her mom she was visitingregularly in the assisted
living.
So you know I did see a glimpseof it, but it was really more.
When I saw this video video tooI was like that can't be
(04:45):
accurate, that it's that bad.
And it turns out, it's really, Imean, that was a very unusual
focus, for I mean really onlyfocused on worst case scenarios.
So I've kind of since learned,you know, a lot of caregivers
really do go through challenges,significant challenges.
That's my passion.
But a lot of them have a greatexperience too.
I mean, they love, they lovecaring for their loved ones.
(05:05):
So, yeah, it's not all bad, butit was the scare tactic of that
video that really got me to sayI'm.
This is what I'm going to do.
Speaker 1 (05:13):
I'm going to go with this population in the class of
like I don't know that I want totouch this and you're like
that's messed up.
I should fix it if I can.
Speaker 2 (05:25):
Yeah exactly.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
That's cool of you.
So how would you say yourbackground, because you said you
got really into kind of thepsychology and human development
.
How has that influenced yourapproach to dementia care and
studying it?
Compared to, I think, a lot ofpeople in the dementia care
space and research, they comemore from the medical side,
whether it's a nurse or aphysician, versus a psychology
(05:48):
side.
What would you say is differentfor you and your approach?
Speaker 2 (05:52):
Yeah, so human development and family studies
is sort of a brand ofdevelopmental psychology, so you
can kind of use some of theminterchangeably, although the
family sciences piece isembedded more within my
department.
The interesting thing aboutthis field is that it's, by
definition, multidisciplinary.
So you're getting you'regetting a lot of psychology
(06:14):
theory, but you're also gettingsociology, nursing, there's lots
of, you know, geriatricmedicine.
So it's perfect for me becauseit's a combination of all the
fields and that's really how Ithink about problems.
I don't want to come at asituation or studying something
from a totally like cognitivepsychology, lens or experimental
(06:37):
psychology, which has thesesort of rules about how you
study something, and they'revalid, they're helpful.
But I always think of thingsbroader, as like well, you know
why, let's say, for caregivingfor somebody with dementia at
home, maybe it is the medicalpiece that's really the
challenge, but maybe it's thefamily conflict that you have
with your siblings becausethey're not helping, or maybe
(06:57):
it's the behavioral symptoms ofthe person that you're caring
for.
So you know, the sort ofcomplexity of how to look at
caregiving is just sort ofnaturally requires an
interdisciplinary perspective,and I think that's where my
training comes in.
It was like if you're notfinding what you're looking for
in a developmental psychologyjournal, you go to a nursing
(07:17):
journal and you look at.
You know you can find thingsreally in unique fields that are
really relevant to caregiving.
So I mean, sometimes some ofthe work I'm looking at is, like
you know, economics-based orlike how to design an
age-friendly community tosupport people living at home.
So sometimes it's architectureLike it's a combination of like
(07:40):
how to help people live wellwith this condition, looking at
it from all perspectives.
Speaker 1 (07:45):
Yeah, and I like that .
I think it's the way to getsome of the best solutions is to
say like they are in this onephase of life.
But there's all of these otherthings that support to the
architecture of the house thatthey live in, to the family
relationships, to what it doesfor the rest of their body
physically, which brings inmedical, and so that's a good
(08:06):
approach, I think.
Are there any, or could youdiscuss any, milestones or
turning points that havehappened since that scare tactic
class?
That has kind of been a turningpoint in your career and shaped
your current research approachfrom I want to get into dementia
and study it to what you'respecifically researching now.
Speaker 2 (08:28):
Yeah, I've had some really awesome things happen.
I mean, I was trained by afantastic dementia caregiver
researcher, probably one of thebest in the world, steve Zaret.
He's still a mentor for me, sohe's helped.
I mean, I think that was my.
The luckiest thing in the worldwas starting by working with
him.
But some of the things that Idefinitely have seen a
transition for my own work isthat really early on I was using
(08:50):
a very sort of data-drivenapproach.
We would go collect data youknow or use secondary existing
data sets and I kept sort oftrying to study, like how things
work.
And I did that for a long timeand I felt like that was really
valuable.
But I started interfacing.
Actually, when I moved to Utah,I started interfacing with like
service providers and peoplethat work with the Alzheimer's
(09:13):
Association and people at theDepartment of Health and I
started realizing like theresearch that I'm doing is
really it's okay, but it's notgetting to the people that need
it.
It's like understanding themechanism of how something works
is valuable because it's notgetting to the people that need
it.
It's like understanding themechanism of how something works
is valuable because it helpsyou build a better intervention
to make things better, but Istarted transitioning more into
like what I really want to do isfind ways to help this
(09:36):
population.
I want to talk to theseindividuals.
I want to hear what are theyworried about?
What do they want me to study,essentially?
So I really switched.
I would say, yeah, after movingto Utah.
The first five years I was here,I really started choosing
different projects to work on,focusing much more on
interventions and how to helppeople who are already in the
(09:58):
situation.
And then a major, majormilestone, which was 2022, I
worked with Dan Johnson, who's arepresentative in the district
here covering Cache Valley, theUtah House of Representatives,
and I worked with theAlzheimer's Association Utah
Chapter, the Department ofHealth, and we worked with the
(10:21):
state legislature to securefunding for Utah's Alzheimer's
disease and dementia researchcenter.
So, totally unexpected twist inmy career, I was not thinking I
was going to direct a researchcenter, although I absolutely
love doing that.
But this is where I think, allof a sudden, these 20 years of
work that I've been doing on,you know, understanding how to
(10:41):
help a caregiver, understandingwhat their stress looks like,
building an intervention thatcan help them and then now I'm
in a situation where I get towork with partners across the
state, try to get you knowpresentations, education, these
supportive services out to thepublic.
Like that was really thecatalyst, like having the center
(11:03):
, and now that's a huge part ofmy role is not just to do the
behind the scenes research butto say we have this research, so
everybody, I want you to hearabout it and that's been a major
change and also just absolutelyincredible part of my day.
You know, my day, my week, mymonth was I get to let people
know.
You know you're not alone.
Here's some great resources.
(11:25):
We have amazing partners in thestate.
We're trying to reach peoplewho don't know we exist.
You know, we're trying to helppeople in rural areas where they
don't have a lot of existingformal support networks, and so
that's been a really like all ofa sudden I get to braid all
these different parts of myexpertise together and now I'm
(11:45):
feeling like, okay, now it'sactually it's helping people.
Speaker 1 (11:48):
Yeah, it's super cool and interesting.
Like you said, data, researchon processes and machines and
all these things.
The data is great Cause it'lltell you hey, you just have to
tweak this bolt a little bitright here and the machine will
run better.
But all of the research thatyou're doing, that, therefore,
what is like I have to changebehavior of tons of people and
it's so much more difficult todo that.
(12:10):
And it's cool to be able toactually be in a seat now where
you're like I have all this data, I've done all the research and
now let's impact people with it, rather than just like let's
put it on a shelf but it's like,oh, look at that cute data that
I found.
Speaker 2 (12:24):
Right, Like getting a publication isn't as exciting
to me anymore as doing apresentation to the community.
Where I get to that, you knowthe information from that
publication actually gets intothe ears of people who are
living with this on a dailybasis.
Speaker 1 (12:37):
And they can one feel , I think, heard and validated.
Then, two, you're giving sometools to their tool belt of like
.
Data says this if you do this,it'll help.
Your research examines kind ofthe stress and well-being of the
family caregivers and for theindividuals with dementia.
What are some of the thingsthat you found in this specific
(12:57):
area of like for the familycaregivers as they're helping
the people with dementia?
I'm curious on the impact thatthat has with for the individual
living with dementia.
So like I imagine a familycaregiver that is like a 10 out
of 10 stress, 10 out of 10, likeburnt out, all those things
probably does have a negativeimpact, uh, effect or an adverse
(13:21):
effect on the individual withdementia, compared to somebody
that has all these resources andis stressful.
You know it's still a three,four or five, but I imagine that
has a better outcome and didyou find anything like that as
people?
So I think caregivers alwaysput themselves in the back seat
and then, but it probably hasactually worse effects on their
loved one.
Speaker 2 (13:42):
Yeah.
So we, you know, very early on,kind of back when I was still
studying more of this basicresearch not intervention
research there was a lot ofinteresting stuff that was
coming out of a large data setbased in Cache County called the
Cache County Study of Memoryand Aging, and we were finding a
lot of different analyses thatwere showing that the care
environment impacts theprogression of dementia.
(14:03):
So like there's a lot ofdifferent analyses that were
showing that the careenvironment impacts the
progression of dementia.
So like there there's a lot ofdifferent ways to unpack that Um
.
But you know, providing like acognitively stimulating
environment seemed to have aprotective role.
Early on in dementia Peopledeclined a little bit slower Um,
having a lot of emotionalsupport from the, the caregiver,
feeling like this relationshipwas a close one, was helpful for
(14:26):
the person with dementia.
So really early on again,before we got into intervention
work, we knew that the careenvironment mattered for both
the caregiver and for the personwith dementia.
Some of the things that I'veyou know, that I've learned as
we've worked on differentinterventions, tested them to
see if they work.
I think the first and mostimportant thing is that most
(14:49):
caregivers do not know thatthere are interventions
available.
So there's this sort ofrealistic thing that we live
with in caregiver research,which is that caregivers, by
definition, they're goingthrough a lot and it's really
hard to take on one more thing,so it's often they
don't know that they're goingthrough a lot and it's really
hard to take on one more thing.
So it's often they don't knowthat they're available or if
they do know, they're like Ijust don't have time, which is
(15:10):
understandable and I'm veryempathetic to that.
I think you know, I thinkdesigning an intervention that
requires them to drive and comein for an hour and find somebody
to supervise their loved oneyou know I've done research on
those and those interventionswork.
But I think that you know I'vedone research on those and those
interventions work.
But I think that you know, overtime I started feeling again
much more practical about how dowe reach a population that they
have a hard time driving andyou know we can't necessarily
(15:31):
get them to drive from a ruralarea to Logan or to Salt Lake or
St George or something.
So it's like we have to reallystart to pivot what we're doing
to fit their life and not havethem like sign up for our
studies and we deliver them theway we think they should be
delivered.
So so the transition that I'vetaken with my own work and
really passionate about is totry to build some of these
(15:54):
interventions to be online andself-guided, so you don't need
to pay for a therapist.
You can do it at four o'clockin the afternoon or 4am If
you're awake.
You can do it whenever you want, and so those.
The exciting piece for me isthat those kinds of online
interventions I mean we werestill sort of in this early
stage of like we know they workfor other populations, will they
(16:15):
work for dementia caregivers?
And so far the two studies thatwe've done on this particular
kind of intervention has shownthat yeah, online self-guided,
as long as caregivers sort ofknow it's there and they sign up
.
The other thing too is theywould if they were to drop out
of our studies.
It was after they said, yeah,I'll sign up for this research
study, and before they actuallystarted the intervention, right,
(16:37):
it was like again thatoverwhelming of like, yeah, I'll
work out, I'll do that, andthen you just don't do it.
So we found that once peoplestarted the online modules, they
stuck with it, and so that hasbeen just really, again kind of
helpful for them.
But also, like from aresearcher's perspective, just
so exciting that if you can getin-person help, if you have
(17:00):
access to a therapist,absolutely use human beings.
Like you know, there's nothingbetter than having a
conversation where you feel thatyou've been heard.
But if you don't have access tothat or that's difficult, then
there's, it's not like thenthere's nothing available.
There's there's these onlinesupportive services that help
the caregiver manage theirstress better.
(17:20):
So we're not making the stressgo away.
That's not the point.
That's we can't make it go away.
So we're just trying to helppeople live with that better.
And through these, the way thatwe assess whether the
interventions work is we do sortof these let's get it, measure
your depressive symptoms, youranxiety symptoms and see if
those improved.
But we also interview and weask questions about you know,
(17:41):
how did you apply it?
When did it help?
And some of the responses werereally great.
It was like I found that, youknow, when my mom was just
repeating the same question overand over and over again, which
is, you know, distressing for alot of people.
Even if you're a patient person, you know we see that they're
reporting, that they'reresponding to that better.
They're like living with thatbetter.
(18:04):
One person has said somethinginteresting.
I remember that she used to Ithink this was a she too she
used to leave the room when herhusband was being really
disruptive, like she justcouldn't handle it.
And then, through theseinterventions and sort of
learning how to live withdifficult situations, learning
that avoidance isn't always thehealthiest for yourself, you
know, she started thinking likehe's in distress, like this is,
(18:26):
I'm his caregiver and I, youknow, by me walking out of the
room, that's not actually likewhat I want to do.
I think of myself as a helpfulperson, and so she just changed
her approach to care.
So I think that those are thekinds of things that you know we
(18:48):
want caregivers to know is that, like, by managing their own
stress, they're going to bebetter for themselves, but also
they're going to be providingcare in a way that's probably
more like in alignment with howthey want to be instead of
stressed out and worried and youknow all legitimate feelings
for sure.
We don't want to say don't beworried and don't be stressed.
We just want people tounderstand that you can be
worried and stressed and stillprovide really great, you know
quality care.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Yeah, I love that.
I think, beth, that was areally great idea.
To be like hey, let's makesomething virtual, to the point
of going to the gym.
Example, like I'm going to workout, and then it's like wait,
actually I don't want to get upat six or 5.00 AM.
Just like how there's onlineresources that like kind of
getting a taste right, likeversus I need to drive, carve
out time, find somebody to comewatch my spouse or my grandma or
(19:30):
my mom, um, it's like I can dothis at four and if it's
valuable for spending a littlebit of time online, very low.
It's like oh, there's, I think,that an actual in-person
intervention and bringing people.
It's like meeting them wherethey're at.
It's kind of a first level forthem to start to experience
everything.
And I also liked how you talkedabout how do they want to show
(19:53):
up?
Because nobody.
I feel this is a broad brush.
I feel like caregivers don'twant to be brash or impatient or
whatever, like they want to beloving and their whole life
right, if it's their mom orwhatever, they've been a loving
daughter and dah, dah, dah, dahdah.
But it's difficult, it's beingable to step back and say I'm a
(20:14):
loving daughter.
She's in distress, just like Iwas.
As you said that I was thinkingabout.
I have a three-year-old son.
We just moved.
He was lashing out and stuff.
My wife, understandably soafter a long day, was a little
bit impatient.
I'm like this is a lot for him.
He's not lashing out because ofwhatever it's like there's
change, his life is disrupted,all these things.
So it's the same.
It's just a different kind ofdynamic because it's for an
(20:37):
elderly loved one.
One of the interventions thatI'd love for you to talk a
little bit more about you talkeda little bit, I think, on it,
but it's the acceptance and thenthe commitment therapy
interventions that you'vedeveloped with dementia
caregivers.
I'd love for you to talk aboutthat and kind of their
effectiveness.
Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yeah, so this is yeah , this is my passion project
right now.
So if you picked the right oneto discuss because if you picked
a different one I'd be like, no, can we talk about the other
one yeah, so ACT has been aroundfor a while decades it's
actually being used veryconsistently in in-person
therapy, so I can't take creditfor this approach.
(21:15):
It's been around and reallywell studied.
There's like over a thousanddifferent studies that are like
the most robust sciencerandomized control trial studies
where that shows thatacceptance and commitment
therapy works across manydifferent populations.
So we happen to be lucky enoughto have two plus experts at USU
that are this is their area isacceptance and commitment
(21:37):
therapy.
I've heard them.
I heard them on how thismechanism works and instantly I
thought this we got to do thiswith dementia caregivers.
Like this is a perfect type ofapproach because, scientifically
validated, it is based incognitive behavioral therapy, so
everyone's pretty comfortablewith that as like an accepted
form of therapy.
(21:58):
Yeah, um, and then there's somecomponents of ACT that are
really important, but the bestpart was that these researchers
have adapted it to an onlineformat.
So they had done all the hardwork of figuring out whether
this could be done in an onlineformat, and then they were
gracious enough to collaboratewith me so that we could say,
all right, now let's take theseonline formats, let's adapt them
(22:20):
for dementia caregivers so thatthey relate to the topic.
They see some of their stressembedded in these examples.
We're prompting them withthings that are kind of
caregiver specific.
So that all started reallyaround 2017, where that marriage
between dementia caregivinginterventions and ACT online ACT
(22:41):
kind of came together here atUSU and there are other places
in the world, actually, thathave done the same thing.
There's some other online ACTprograms, but okay, so let's
talk a little bit about why thiswas.
Just I felt like so passionateabout this being a great fit.
So you know, a lot of thecaregiver interventions that I
had been familiar with were likeokay, your loved one is asking
(23:05):
questions repeatedly, they'rewandering, they might be
aggressive.
So a lot of it was looking atthe symptoms of the person with
dementia and trying to help them, like trying to say, well,
what's confusing for them, youknow, kind of let's adapt the
environment so it's lessstressful for them.
So a lot of it was kind ofabout let's try to reduce their
(23:27):
symptoms, and sometimes that'seffective.
Of course, if you can make abetter environment for somebody
where they're not distressed,that's great.
Start there.
But there's just so much withdementia that you cannot control
, you can't, you know, askpolitely for them to stop asking
the question over and overagain.
I mean, they're just, they havebrain damage.
So I think it felt to me like Ididn't want the burden of
(23:49):
change to be on the person withdementia.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
They don't have to do better to make the caregiver's
life easier, right, it's just,it's sort of setting people up
for it's challenging, Especiallyas dementia progresses right
Like I might work early on, butover the years, months, years,
it's a different challenge everyfew months, you know, and so
it's a lot of moving parts andthe piece about acceptance and
commitment therapy is that it isconsidered what they call a
(24:28):
trans-diagnostic approach, whichis a fancy word for saying it
works for a lot of problems.
Speaker 2 (24:33):
It helps with depressive symptoms, it helps
with anxiety symptoms, helpswith grief and, as I'm talking,
you know add more.
You know sort of mental healthissues or concerns onto that
list and that's where I feltlike you know sort of mental
health issues or concerns ontothat list and that's where I
felt like you know somecaregivers are so anxious.
Speaker 1 (24:52):
I mean, that's their, you know, that's their reaction
.
Yeah, without this, withoutdimension in their life, they're
anxious.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
And then others are going through intense grief and,
as I mentioned, others are likethe caregiving situation's fine
, my work life has just gone outthe window or my social
relationships have been failing.
So it just felt like caregivershave their own, like they have
their own needs that are unique.
It's not like one interventionfits all.
Like if you give anintervention on, like well,
(25:18):
let's build up your socialsupport network Super important
to do that but like maybe socialsupport isn't what they're
worried about, maybe they'reworried about grief and loss.
So ACT is just because it'sreally focused on whatever your
issue is, let's work on.
That is kind of how it works.
So, again, if it's anxietysymptoms, if it's conflict, if
it's, et cetera, grief, it'steaching people to say, like
(25:43):
most of us, when we say let'ssay grief is a good example,
you're, you're grieving the lossof this person who's right in
front of you, but therelationship has changed.
And a lot of times when thosefeelings of grief will pop up,
we we really try to avoid them.
We just say like I don't wantto go there, I'm going to
distract myself, or I'm going tojust be happy, happy, happy, or
I'm going to binge watch, youknow, seven episodes of Netflix,
(26:06):
like we do this thing wherewe're like I don't want to feel
that way, so we avoid that.
And ACT is about starting tobecome more comfortable with
like letting those feelings showup and actually eventually
getting to the part, to theplace where you might even be,
not just like okay with thembeing there, but like kind of
curious, like I wonder why likewhy is today?
Speaker 1 (26:28):
why am?
Speaker 2 (26:28):
I feeling such grief today.
So first step is just kind ofgiving yourself compassion and
permission to feel the prettystrong emotions that we tend to
do our best to like run awayfrom and then and then the
second piece, which is reallyimportant, is to sort of do
things the way you want to dothem anyway.
(26:48):
So if you are somebody that,there's a really great exercise
that we do in our interventionwhere we say, like, pick a
characteristic that you think isreally like you love when you
do it, you love when you see itin other people.
So you know things like peoplethat are patient or
compassionate or whatever, pickyour flavor, joyful, and you
pick one of those.
(27:09):
You're just like, yeah, likejoyful, like I, just like I like
when I'm joyful, I like whenother people are joyful, and you
start to think about all youreveryday activities that you're
doing, including caregiving.
How do you do them joyfully?
So it's like I can be sad and Ican have grief and anger, but I
can also.
I like, I like joyful.
Speaker 1 (27:28):
I can, I can try to be anyways, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:32):
So it's like kind of feel, feeling what you're
feeling.
But then you know againcompassion, how can I, how can I
be a compassionate caregiver,how can I be a patient caregiver
?
And it's not to say you have todo all these things perfectly
like, oh yeah, all thesewonderful characteristics,
figure out how to do them.
You pick one and you just tryto integrate it into your daily
activities as much as you can,and sometimes that's enough to
(27:54):
like just get yourself to kindof check, like am I really going
to yell at this person and belike you already asked that
question?
Or you're going to say wait aminute, compassionately.
Compassion, like how am I goingto say this differently?
You just feel better about yourresponse when you do it in a
way that's aligned with your ownvalues.
And then there's also someimportant sort of mindfulness
(28:19):
and meditation type pieces ofagain, when we're distressed,
we're usually really reactive,right, so we're in the moment.
These emotions are gettingbigger and bigger and bigger,
and just a lot of like focusingon the present and deep
breathing and those kinds ofthings that deescalate your
physiological reactivity to thesituation so that you can like
(28:40):
have enough like brain space tosay, all right, now that I've
breathed.
How is it that I want torespond to this scenario?
Because that's kind of where wetend to go off base, right?
It's like we all behave exactlyhow we want to behave when
there's no stress in our lives.
Speaker 1 (28:54):
Like oh yeah, we're compassionate.
Speaker 2 (28:55):
We're joyful, like yeah, when there's no stress,
easy peasy, right.
But then as soon as we'restressed, that's when we start
to say I'm going off the rails,I'm getting impatient, I'm
getting, you know, I'm behavingin ways that I don't like.
So then we feel guilt when webehave in ways we don't like.
So now we're adding guilt ontop of the anger, like it's.
So this is a little bit of asnowball of like.
(29:16):
If we just pause and we sayanger is allowed to be there,
frustration is allowed to bethere, let's not snowball this
into anything bigger than it is.
Take a deep breath and thenlet's try to behave in a way
that's aligned with how we wantto behave.
So you know, it doesn't take aton of steps to sort of set this
up for caregivers.
In our interventions we havesome prompts and you know what's
(29:37):
an emotion that you're, thatyou struggle with, and here's
some things you might be doing.
Pick one and they kind of linkup together and they have some
practice exercises.
So I mean acceptance andcommitment therapy is.
There's so many resources freeonline.
You can Google stuff, you cango on YouTube really awesome
little clips on like oh yeah, Iguess I do you know I do that
(29:58):
and I could work on that.
So so this is why I think youknow again, this isn't it's.
I didn't recreate somethingthat wasn't already there.
I think what we did was we tooksomething that was working
really well in other populationsand we said let's help people
who are in a very distressingsituation that they can't get
out of.
Uh, let's help them live withit a little better.
Speaker 1 (30:19):
Yeah, I love that.
I think, like you said, it's,it's taking something and
applying it to a population thatI think gets overlooked.
Just as much as people withdementia get overlooked, those
caring for them get it even moreso maybe.
And so helping them, givingthem some tools, like a pause to
reenergize, like just breatheand I like to the point of
(30:44):
acknowledging the emotion andthen showing up how you like to
anyways, I think is moreempowering than just not
acknowledging the emotion andforcing yourself to show up
joyfully the best you can,because that's shoving it down
and then eventually you're goingto blow up, versus just saying
like I am so frustrated rightnow, with the 80th time that
she's asked me that question, itseems like in the last two
(31:05):
minutes, um, somehow, and it'sjust like that's really
frustrating, but how can I re-on?
So I think that that's I reallylove, um, act, acceptance and
commitment therapy.
I think it's a great tool thatretrofitting it to this
population was a great, a greatstep in the right direction.
Um, you talked about joy.
(31:26):
This is we're already at 31minutes, which is insane to me.
But speaking of joy, and maybewe'll end on this, you did a
TEDx talk called Finding Joy inAlzheimer's Reality and you
discussed finding the joy amidstthe challenges that come with
Alzheimer's.
I would love for you to kind ofelaborate on that perspective
(31:46):
as you.
How can people find joy throughAlzheimer's?
Speaker 2 (31:51):
Yeah, yeah.
So it's like you know a lot oftimes, especially in earlier
stages of of any kind ofdementia but sometimes it
progresses even even longer.
Where you know as somebody is,you know, asking questions
repeatedly or they're mixingsomething up, that's, you know,
important.
Their caregivers are correctingthem right, and you know in the
(32:11):
very beginning maybe there'snothing wrong with that.
The person, if the person withdementia, is like, oh thanks,
sorry, I messed that person'sname up or I can't remember what
we did five minutes ago.
Fine, you can go ahead and, youknow, give them the information.
But as things progress, wesometimes see this kind of
incompatibility.
That's happening where a personwith dementia is, you know,
talking about like, oh, thisweekend we're going to get in
(32:34):
the car, we're going to go toIdaho, right, and the caregiver
is like, we're not going toIdaho, you can't even drive
anymore, like, and so there'sthis battle.
I think about like what's thereality?
And it's really common, right,I mean, it's like, it's not,
it's understandable that ithappens, but there's a lot of
like challenge in that approach.
And so the joyful part comeswhere.
(32:55):
I mean, I've heard there's someimprov comedians that have done
a lot on this, where treatingdementia like improv, like
they're going to throw you aline and it makes no sense
whatsoever and you're just goingto throw something back and and
the thing about is it makes itlight and it makes it fun.
And so if you just start saying, like, where are we going to
Idaho?
Um, you know, and they startdiscussing something and you're
(33:18):
like, well, what do you want toeat?
Should we pack, you know, doyou want to pack hamburgers or
whatever it is.
You just go with this.
You know in reality you're notgoing to Idaho, but like it's
still a really nice conversationthat you've had with somebody,
and so you have to be kind offluid and sometimes it gets you
feel silly.
But you know, I thinkcorrecting people nobody likes
(33:38):
to be corrected all the time andwe have to understand that
their reality is the reality.
Like we can't change that.
We can't bring them back towhere we are in the present
moment and get them tounderstand.
You know exactly how it is thatthings truly are.
So our only option is to jumpin, join their whatever it is
and go with it.
(33:58):
And it is hard.
You kind of have to like improvalmost you have to train
yourself a little bit to do that.
You kind of have to like improvalmost you have to train
yourself a little bit to do that.
But what I've you know what Ifound when I go into assisted
living or memory care I don'tknow individuals, like I don't
have a meaningful relationshipwith these individuals.
I'm just walking in but rightaway you know saying hello,
doing a little dance.
You know telling somebody my.
You know your hair is gorgeous,or I love that sweater on you
(34:22):
and and they are like wow, likethat was really, really nice.
And so you can say that.
You know, if they approach youfive minutes later, you can tell
them again like that's abeautiful sweater, I really like
that.
And then once again you seethem kind of light up.
And so there is this like thingthat we can do to train
ourselves that like it's we canbring the joy to like if we let
(34:46):
them know.
You know, this is a good day,I'm a good person, I'm in a good
mood.
Whatever you say, we can banterback and forth in a way that's
not combative.
We end up finding more kind ofjoyful moments in the exchange.
We're not going to get them toour reality, but we can still
have fun with it.
And I think too, you know to becautionary, to not like the
whole laughing at them, right.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
Yeah.
People with dementia can feelthat too, that they're, that,
they're that end of the joke.
They're not in it, right?
Yeah, it's not.
Yeah, it's laughing with themand just kind of going with it.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
That's actually what I loved about that job in the
assisted living way back when Iwas 16 years old was like I
don't, I have no trading, I haveno idea what I'm doing, but
this person thinks they're at ahotel and let's just go with it.
Let's go get some towels and,you know, take them to this
beautiful room that, uh, anyway,so it was sort of a something I
learned on the fly, but, um,yeah, something I think that we
(35:37):
can all, we can all do better atat bringing those sort of
moments of joy to people withdementia.
Speaker 1 (35:43):
Yeah, one of my favorite stories oh, I can't
remember it was.
One of our guests came on,talked about going into a memory
care and there were these foursweet ladies sitting around a
table, laughing, having the timeof their life.
And she walked over and likeeavesdropped for a minute.
They were all having 0% relatedconversations.
They were just like talkingdifferently but they were just
(36:05):
having the time of their life,even though none of it connected
.
Somebody was like talking abouttheir trip to Hawaii whenever
that happened, and somebody elsewas talking about her dog that
day and everybody was just likelaughing.
So I think that going in andenjoying the time, you know,
creating a joyful moment for forthem, even though the the grand
(36:25):
scheme, maybe it's not joyful,but you can make joyful moments
all throughout it, so I lovethat.
Um last two, last two questionswhat trends or emerging trends
in dementia care do you dementiacare research, uh, do you see
and are most excited about?
Speaker 2 (36:44):
Well, I mean, first and foremost, we are, we as in
collectively.
Research as a whole is makingheadway in some treatments for
Alzheimer's.
Speaker 1 (36:52):
Still slow.
The last person we had ontalked about there was something
out there that helps get the.
Oh, what is it in your brain?
Speaker 2 (37:00):
The beta amyloid.
Speaker 1 (37:01):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:02):
I was like wow, that's insane.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
That's awesome.
Speaker 2 (37:04):
Yeah.
So I mean, I think that thosekinds of things are exciting and
and, um, you know I'm on theboard for the Alzheimer's
association in Utah.
We get updates on on researchall the time and when you look
at the numbers of studies thatare going on right now some of
them looking at amyloid, somelooking at another protein
called tau, some looking atinflammation we're really really
(37:25):
thinking of this differently,as a disease that you know
there's a lot of issues going onin the brain.
We're not going to solve itwith, you know, probably not
going to solve it by, like,finding the one medication.
So I think that that, to me, isa really exciting time because
at least you know, for the firsttime in my career, when people
say, do you think there's goingto be a cure or a treatment, I
(37:46):
say yes, I think there's goingto be treatment that is going to
slow the progression of thisdisease.
We're already there a littlebit and I think there's a lot of
funding that's being pivotedtowards Alzheimer's research
right now, which is great.
So that's the most excitingthing.
That's not my world ofcaregiver research, but as a
whole.
(38:07):
I would love to talk myself tohave a job right To say we don't
, I don't have to studyAlzheimer's anymore.
Um, you know it's not going tohappen overnight, but we're, but
we're getting there, and so Ithink that hope is important.
Um, and so, yeah, the othertrends I would say too would be
and these are also, I think,really valuable.
We're seeing this is more of aconnection between, like, policy
(38:30):
and research.
There used to be, I felt, astrong sort of barrier almost of
again what's happening in theresearch world, what's happening
in the services world, kind oflike, well, they don't
understand us and we don'tunderstand them.
And now I think there's a lotmore like we all got to work
together here.
You know there's not as muchfunding.
We all have to share ourresources, and so I think that
(38:54):
that trend is actually fantasticbecause it's helping
researchers understand you knowhow can you fit your research
into public policy, or you knowpolicy like, if you're going to
spend money on an intervention,why don't you do it on one that
has, you know, some empiricalvalidation that it's a good,
that it's a good intervention?
So I think there's a reallypromising trend where the work
(39:16):
that's being done in these sortof different silos is now
blending together much healthierrelationships between research,
like service providers, andpolicy.
It's a.
It's kind of a, it's anoptimistic time for me.
I mean, I go to these meetingsand you can see nobody's
fighting over territory.
They're just like no, what doyou got?
Okay, I'll help you.
(39:37):
Let's go get this out to my.
You know, can you go do somelobbyist work?
Like there's just a morehealthy connection between
everybody that wants to work onyou know, in this area that's
awesome.
Speaker 1 (39:49):
I think that those are awesome.
Really exciting trend, reallyexciting things to come to pass
over the next however long,whether it's 40 years or four
years, like it's it's cool tosee that there's it's getting
more focus and maybe it's by thetime I'm 80, it won't be
something that's so scary, youknow.
(40:09):
Last question what advice wouldyou offer to new researchers
that are entering the field ofdementia and caregiver studies?
Speaker 2 (40:19):
Yeah, I think you know.
Again I would say, make thoseconnections very similar to my
last answer of like my, the mostexciting things in my career
came from you know.
Again I would say, make thoseconnections very similar to my
last answer of like my, the mostexciting things in my career
came from.
You know I sat at meetings for10 years with the Department of
Health and you know there wasn'tfunding coming in for research,
but I saw the utility in likethe work that they were doing
(40:40):
and so being a partner with themfor a long time without, let's
say, personal like gain, like Iwasn't getting funding, I wasn't
even necessarily getting a lotof participants for my research,
but like that was one of themost valuable things I invested
in was like if you want yourwork to have impact, you have to
find the organizations that areable to, you know, put your
(41:04):
work forward or like our workreally not my work, but like all
of us and so networking piececan be time consuming and as
researchers, you know there's alot of grind.
There's like write the grantsdo the analysis, put the papers
out.
So of course, all that has tohappen, that's our metric,
that's how we, you know, we sortof get our work out there.
(41:25):
But I think that there isimportance in the personal
connections of your community.
So, connecting with serviceproviders, go in and talk to the
assisted living facilities, goin and talk to the you know
Department of Health or theAlzheimer's Association and
build relationships, because,again, it's like this teamwork
approach is making things moveforward so much faster than I
(41:48):
could have done without those,you know, without those
relationships, and so I thinkit's just been a really, it's
been a win-win for our state,even like.
We've gotten recognized as astate for working really well
together with theseorganizations, even without
funding to support that.
So, yeah, I would say there's alot of like.
You're the researcher brain isabsolutely necessary and you
(42:13):
know you got to.
You have to develop that.
But there is this piece of like, the.
So what?
Like?
Don't do it for the sake of amanuscript, do it for the sake
of like, who might benefit fromit directly.
Speaker 1 (42:24):
Yeah, I like that.
Have a long-term perspectiverather than let's get a
manuscript published and whatnot.
It's like how do we make changeover the next decade?
Well, Dr Beth Fouth, it's beena lot of fun talking to you.
I can't recommend enough foranybody working in dementia or
with a caregiver of a client ora family member with dementia go
(42:48):
listen to your TEDx talk aboutfinding joy in an Alzheimer's
reality and then just all theresearch that you're doing.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
I appreciate the work that you that you're doing and
giving some time to myself andthe listeners, so yeah, and then
I'll just mention if anybody'scurious about anything I talked
about, they can come to ourwebsite too.
It's adrcusuedu.
We've got resources on a clinicthat we offer for free
(43:14):
telehealth and in person.
We've got research studies thatwe're recruiting for.
They can just connect with me.
I can direct them to morespecific things.
So yeah, just anybody listening.
If they want to reach out, I'mhappy to receive an email or or
just connecting on the websiteAwesome adrcusuedu.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
Yeah, awesome, okay, well, beth, thank you so much.
I'm excited to publish this.
Speaker 2 (43:35):
Yeah, thanks, gail.
Appreciate all you're doing.
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