(1109) Bridging Dementia Care Gaps: Community Pharmacists as Navigators

Objectives: The escalating prevalence of Alzheimer's Disease and Related Dementias (ADRD) is placing increasing strain on family caregivers of individuals living with dementia. While resources exist to support the needs of both dementia patients and their caregivers, fragmented care coordination often serves as an obstacle to accessing these resources. Community pharmacists have the potential to enhance resource accessibility by assuming the role of dementia care navigators within their local communities. This study seeks to identify public perceptions regarding community pharmacists as dementia care navigators, with the aim of informing future interventions and enhancing dementia care accessibility.

Methods: This IRB-approved study obtained informed consent from all participants. Data collection was done via an online survey hosted on Google Forms. The survey, designed by the investigators, aimed to capture respondents' perceptions of dementia care navigators. It included questions about: 1) services they believed dementia care navigators could offer (2 multiple response items); 2) preferred communication methods with navigators, such as telephone or video chat (1 multiple response item); 3) trusted sources for dementia-related care (1 multiple response item and 1 multiple choice item); 4) willingness to consult their community pharmacist for dementia information (a 5-point Likert-type item); 5) preferred ways to interact with a pharmacist trained as a dementia care navigator (1 multiple response item); and 6) willingness to pay for a one-hour appointment with a navigator (1 numeric-entry item). The survey underwent content and face validity testing. The final survey was distributed through Amazon Mechanical Turk (MTurk) to a sample of US adults aged 18 and above, limited to those with an MTurk Master qualification and >80% approval rating for MTurk tasks. Participants received $5 upon survey completion. Descriptive statistics in SPSS were used for data analysis.

Results: A total of 300 surveys were completed. Approximately 53% of respondents were male, 84.0% were White, 64.0% were aged 35-54, and 48.0% (n=144) had cared for someone with ADRD (caregivers). About 90% believed dementia care navigators could provide contact information for adult daycare services, 88% for home helpers, 78% for home care planning, and 48% for coordinating pharmacist medication reviews. Regarding preferred communication methods with navigators, 70% favored face-to-face office visits, 68% preferred telephone communication, 61% favored email, 44% liked text messaging, and 39% preferred online chat. When it came to trusting individuals for dementia-related information, 94% trusted physicians, 62% trusted nurses, 39% trusted friends or family, and 28% trusted pharmacists. However, if their local pharmacist were trained as a dementia care navigator, 80% were likely or very likely to seek dementia information from them. Desired information from pharmacist navigators included contact details for necessary dementia services conveyed through conversation (82%) or in a brochure (62%), and contact information for local senior services organizations (57%). Willingness to pay for a 1-hour appointment with a dementia care navigator ranged from $0 (n=6) to $300 (n=1), with nearly 25% (n=74) expressing a willingness to pay $50.

Conclusions: Participants recognized the potential of dementia care navigators to offer a broad spectrum of services focused on facilitating access to home and community-based resources. While a majority expressed a preference for in-office visits with dementia care navigators, some indicated a desire for alternative communication methods like text messages or online chats. Notably, although only 28% initially reported trust in pharmacists to provide dementia information, 80% would consider consulting their local pharmacist if trained as a dementia care navigator. Future research should explore the development of training programs for community pharmacists to assume the role of dementia care navigators in their respective communities.