IMOVE: Improvisational Movement for People With Memory Loss and Their Caregivers

Dementia is a progressive decline in cognition that impairs a person's ability to perform activities of daily living. Alzheimer's disease is the most common form of dementia, the most common neurodegenerative disease in older adults, and the 6th leading cause of death in the US. Neuropsychiatric symptoms (apathy, depression, anxiety) and altered gait and balance are prominent secondary symptoms of Alzheimer's disease that increase medical costs and decrease quality of life for both the person with dementia and their caregiver.

In a report from the Secretariat (Executive Board, 134th Session, December 20th, 2013), the World Health Organization identified a need to integrate evidence-based palliative care services into the continuum of care for serious chronic diseases, including Alzheimer's disease. However, two recent NIH workshops identified major gaps in the evidence supporting the wider use of non-pharmacologic activities to ameliorate secondary symptoms of chronic disease. Arts-based activities were identified as particularly understudied for symptom management, given growing evidence that various arts-based activities can improve quality of life, relieve symptoms, and reduce reliance on medications. It is important that these benefits can be achieved without adding medications. Dance is an arts-based activity that can improve quality of life, decrease symptoms of depression, and improve balance in healthy older adults, those with Parkinson disease, and Alzheimer's disease. Thus, dance is a non-pharmacological intervention that simultaneously addresses two sets of prominent secondary symptoms in Alzheimer's disease: 1) gait and balance and 2) neuropsychiatric symptoms. However, the mechanisms through which dance exerts these effects are unknown.

Pilot data from the investigators' laboratory suggest that participating in a group improvisational movement class twice weekly improved balance and connectivity in motor-related brain regions, as well as improving mood and connectivity in brain regions associated with social engagement. Improvisation is the ability to create new gestures and movements spontaneously. Improvisation can be a part of many different art forms. However, improvisational movement can also be practiced as a specific dance form. The objective in improvisational movement is that choreographed movement is replaced by a cue or prompt that allows the possibility for multiple responses. This unique form of dance is especially well-suited for people with dementia because it: 1) does not rely heavily on memory of repeated movements; 2) can be seamlessly adapted to include sitting, standing, or moving around the room; 3) is cognitively challenging; and 4) fosters a social, playful atmosphere. Participants seemed to benefit from both the social nature of the class and the movement. Therefore, the overall aim of this proposal is to experimentally determine the independent and combined effects of dance movement and social engagement on quality of life in people with early stage dementia, and test the neural mechanisms of these effects.

To accomplish this goal, the investigators will use a 2x2 factorial design and randomize 120 community-dwelling older adults adjudicated as having early-stage dementia of the presumed Alzheimer's type to one of four 3-month interventions: 1) Dance Group, 2) Non-group Dance, 3) Social Group, or 4) No Contact Control.

It is not hypothesized that dance affects the underlying disease course, and therefore no improvement is expected in cognition.