Graduate Student Scholarship

Graduate student scholarship

One of our Hope for Tomorrow initiatives is the Alzheimer Society Graduate Student Award, which supports a graduate student at the University of Regina's Centre on Aging and Health. Commencing in 2011, the Centre on Aging and Health awards the Alzheimer Society Graduate Student Award for $5,000 yearly through a peer-review process.

"The Graduate Scholarship is important for attracting and retaining high-quality graduate student researchers," says Scott J. Wilson, Administrator for the Centre on Aging and Health. Wilson feels, "Amidst a time of diminishing research funding, awards such as this are crucial to the University of Regina and the Centre on Aging and Health, both of which support better and increased graduate research and learning."

The 2014-2015 Graduate Student Research Scholarship recipient is Dipeshri Warang

Research abstract

With Canada’s aging population, increasing numbers of elderly individuals are being diagnosed with dementia. By 2038, 1.1 million Canadians will have dementia. This increasing trend of dementia will negatively influence family relationships as the caregiving burden increases. Providing care for people with dementia is extremely stressful. When home care is no longer sufficient for the well-being of people with dementia, family care partners move their loved ones with dementia into long term care (LTC) homes, yet care partners continue to experience stress. The reason for the lack of differences in stress levels of family care partners even when people with dementia have moved into a LTC facility has not been effectively addressed. A study by Gaugler, Anderson, Zarit, and Pearlin suggested that greater involvement of family care partners in the care of people with dementia in LTC is positively associated with the well being of both the family care partners and people with dementia. However, no study has described how people with dementia living in LTC perceive the involvement of their family in their care. Thus, the purpose of my study is to investigate how people with dementia who are living in LTC perceive and experience the role of their family in their care. I am interested in understanding how they experience relationships with their family care partners after moving into a LTC home. This study will employ a qualitative research approach to explore the experience of people with dementia living in a LTC home. The conclusions of this research will not only address the well-being of people with dementia but it may also increase the care partners’ satisfaction about their caring role and reduce their sense of guilt.