About Homeside

The primary aim of the project is to demonstrate, for the first time, the effectiveness of a 3-month caregiver-delivered, home-based music intervention on the short-term behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia. This home-based intervention will be compared to standard care. The project will also evaluate the effectiveness of the music intervention compared to a reading intervention.

Secondary aims include examining relationship quality between the caregiver and the person living with dementia. This means measuring levels of depression, resilience, competence and quality of life in the caregiver, and quality of life in the person living with dementia. Our randomised controlled trial will compare the music intervention delivered by trained caregivers and standard care, with standard care alone (primary comparison), and with reading and standard care being another active intervention. Cost effectiveness of the music interventions compared to standard care and reading interventions will be done to determine whether the music interventions are clinically effective and cost-effective.

Our project aims to address the need for improved informal care by training cohabiting caregivers to implement music and reading interventions that target behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, and the quality of life and well-being of people with dementia and of their caregivers. Our study is a large international three-arm parallel group randomized controlled trial involving 495 dyads from Australia, Germany, United Kingdom, Poland and Norway. As the majority of people with dementia live in the community and not in residential care settings, quality informal care for people with dementia is crucial for managing behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, as well as enhancing quality of life. Past studies prove that music therapy can reduce behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, and other studies explore how formal carers use music in their caring roles. However, no large fully powered study has examined the effects of music intervention delivered by caregivers in a home-setting. Homeside addresses this knowledge gap.

Our consortium recognizes the challenges caregivers experience as they undertake the essential care of people with dementia while simultaneously striving to sustain a meaningful and mutually satisfying relationship. As behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia become increasingly difficult to manage with disease progression, caregivers can become overwhelmed cognitively, emotionally and physically. This may have a negative flow-on effect to people with dementia, caregivers and society (e.g. higher rates of illness, greater rates of access to medical and social services). There is thus a need for caregivers to learn about and implement engaging and effective ways to manage behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia and support well-being for the people with dementia. Music interventions have long been used by music therapists to manage behavioural and psychological symptoms of dementia, support relationships, and manage stress. We expect that with support and training the music intervention will be easily implemented in the family home by caregivers.