Me & My Wishes: An Efficacy Trial of Long Term Care Residents With Alzheimer's Using Videos to Communicate Care Preferences With Caregivers

Me & My Wishes are videos of nursing home residents talking about their preferences for care, including four sections: About Me, Preferences for Today, Preferences for Medical Intervention and End of Life, and Afterthoughts. Knowing what residents want is essential to staff's ability to provide quality care and can inform family caregivers decision making especially in later stages of life as the resident's cognition declines-a time when family caregivers often feel unprepared. Persons with mild to moderate dementia can accurately express their everyday and EOL preferences, however, stereotypes persist about the decision making abilities of people with dementia that often prevent their involvement in conversations about care. The investigators propose to conduct a Stage II efficacy trial of Me & My Wishes-a novel approach for communicating resident care preferences-by creating videos with 48-54 nursing home residents with mild to moderate dementia and sharing their personalized video with informal (family) and formal (staff) caregivers. The investigators will employ a randomized wait-list control design in which residents in control nursing homes will delay sharing their video. Videos may be viewed two ways: 1) in resident quarterly care conferences; and 2) via a web-based link with resident-identified family members or friends.