Research

The CESRD is establishing itself as a global leader in economic and social research on dementia. The Centre’s focus is on interdisciplinary collaboration including people with dementia, care-givers, practitioners and policy-makers. Current research projects are outlined below.

Resource Allocation, Priority-Setting and Consensus in Dementia Care

Resource allocation for people with dementia requires careful scrutiny of costs and outcomes. A balance of care approach often provides the framework for optimal pathways to care and placement for people with dementia. This research is concerned with resource allocation decision-making and priority setting for people with dementia on the boundary of care between community and residential settings.

Economics of Informal Care for People with Dementia

This research programme focuses on the economic, social, health and emotional costs of caring for people with dementia. The research will provide longitudinal estimates of the relationships between informal care costs and cognitive function, comorbidities and behavioural changes in people with dementia, including an exploration of the potential of psychosocial interventions and technology-based interventions for care-givers to ameliorate the potential burden of care.

Personhood in Dementia

Understanding personhood within dementia is a key element of good quality dementia care, particularly how relationships are formed, maintained, nurtured and developed during the caring process. The research focuses on understanding the meaning, interpretation and lived experience of personhood for people with dementia, their family carers and formal care providers.

Valuing Psychosocial Care in Dementia

Of particular interest is how person-centred, non-pharmacological approaches to care are valued in dementia and a contingent valuation approach will be used to examine preferences and values from citizens with respect to alternative types of care. The research also involves creating a taxonomy of psychosocial supports in dementia care in Ireland,  including the evaluation of a number of psychosocial interventions.  The research will potentially lead to the development of an integrative framework for the more sustained use of psychosocial interventions in dementia care.

Attributes and Levels of Long-Term Care Provision in Dementia: Willingness to Pay Estimates Derived from a Discrete Choice Experiment

Person-centred care is a multi-faceted concept, but at its core it involves treating people with dementia with dignity and respect in the care process. This research addresses the gap in empirical research in relation to how the public values person-centred care in the dementia context. Our work estimates preferences among citizens for different attributes and levels of formal and informal supports and services for people with dementia living at home using a discrete choice experiment approach.

Dementia Carer’s Research Project

This study looks at the experience of caring for a person diagnosed with dementia or probable dementia since the beginning of 2017, or someone currently seeking diagnosis.