Effects of a digital reminiscing intervention on people with dementia and their care-givers and relatives

Dementia is a source of growing concern globally, and often impacts on social and commu-nicative functioning. INdependent LIving Support Functions for the Elderly (IN LIFE) was aproject carried out within the European Commission Research and Innovation programmeHorizon 2020 that resulted in the development of two digital communication aids for rem-iniscence intervention for elderly people with dementia and their communication partners.The purpose of this intervention study was to investigate the effects on quality of life forpeople with dementia when using these aids. People with dementia (N = 118) and their for-mal care-givers (N = 187) and relatives (N = 9) were given the communication aids for a per-iod of 4–12 weeks. To assess a range of outcomes, questionnaires developed within theproject were used along with the EQ-5D (European Quality of Life – 5 Dimensions) andQoL-AD (Quality of Life in Alzheimer’s Disease) questionnaires. Quality of life improvedamong people with dementia when measured using EQ-5D ( p < 0.05). There was also a cor-relation between the impact on the participants’ health and wellbeing, the carers’ rating ofthe usefulness of the digital communication aids and the care-givers’ satisfaction with usingtechnology ( p < 0.05). These results indicate that digital communication aids may be usefulin social interaction where one partner has dementia.Funding: The IN LIFE project was funded by the European Commission under the Horizon 2020 programme (grant agreement number 643442).