A Qualitative Evaluation of Caregiver Support Services Offered at the Atlanta Veterans Affairs Health Care System

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) provides health care to approximately 300,000 patients with dementia. Recognizing the critical role caregivers play in veterans' health, the Cognitive Disorders Specialty Care Education Center of Excellence (COE) at the Atlanta VA Health Care System implemented a suite of caregiver support services, including formal programs and resource linkages. We evaluated the effectiveness of these services and identified caregiver-perceived gaps in them.

We conducted 11 semistructured interviews from November 2016 through February 2017 with caregivers of veterans seen in the COE who had participated in support services. After coding transcripts, we established a codebook of 9 major themes and conducted a thematic analysis of all transcripts.

Caregivers spoke positively of COE caregiver services that offered information on dementia, social support, an emphasis on caregiver well-being and self-efficacy, and methods for behavioral change. Gaps identified included the need for additional dementia information and practical support in such matters as advanced directives and eligibility for VA benefits.

Our findings will inform future improvements to COE caregiver support services, such as an expansion of COE's caregiver educational content and capacity building of existing components such as resource referrals. These results also highlight opportunities for COE to interface with internal and external organizations to enhance existing caregiver services.