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Theses and Dissertations

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Browsing Theses and Dissertations by Author "Alvord, Christina L., author"

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    The dementia-specific lived environment and life quality model: environmental interventions and roles of expert practitioners
    (Colorado State University. Libraries, 2013) Alvord, Christina L., author; Wood, Wendy, advisor; Eackman, Aaron, committee member; Lynham, Susan A., committee member
    Individuals with Alzheimer's disease and related neurodegenerative dementias (ADRD) are particularly vulnerable to their environments due to diminished abilities to correctly process, organize, and integrate sensory information, leading to potential behavioral problems and functional deficits (Cohen-Mansfield, 2004; Kitwood, 1997). For individuals living in long-term care facilities, qualities of the physical and social environment can have an immediate and compounding effect on the quality of life of residents. Yet, to date there is little research on current best occupational therapy practices related to environmental interventions for people with ADRD living in long-term care. A proposed model of practice unique to occupational therapy called the Lived Environment Life Quality Model provides an appropriate theoretical framework in which to identify and examine processes of physical and social environmental interventions. This research study employed an action research methodology to identify physical and social environmental interventions employed by six expert occupational therapy practitioners, framed within the context of confirming and disconfirming the Lived Environment Life Quality Model. The results showed an overall confirmation of the model. Physical and social environmental interventions identified represent a vast and complex list that infiltrated all aspects of care, with the practitioner operating as a powerful change agent capable of dictating, influencing, and operating as part of the environmental intervention itself. Ultimately, it is important for occupational therapists to serve as ambassadors of care, and step into the foreground of enacting large-scale systems change within all aspects of the physical and social environment of the long-term care facility to elevate quality of life for residents with ADRD.