Uncovering and Responding to the Training Needs of Diverse Older Adults, Their Caregivers, and the Professionals Who Serve Them

Background and Purpose:

Racial and ethnic minorities constitute the fastest growing segment of older adults in the US and have particularly complex needs, including greater morbidity and mortality and reduced access to services compared to Whites (Mahmoudi & Jensen, 2013).  Working effectively with this population requires specialized knowledge and skills on the part of health and social service workers, but there is a serious dearth of well-trained professionals.  Furthermore, poor health literacy among these older adults also plays a significant role in this racial and ethnic disparity in well-being (Choi, 2011).  This paper describes surveys undertaken to uncover and meet information and training needs among older adults, their families, and professionals working with them in an under-resourced, diverse, urban neighborhood in New York.  It also discusses efforts made to address these gaps.

Methods:

A survey designed to understand and ultimately meet the training needs of various stakeholders involved with diverse older adults was developed with input from a Community Council comprised of older adults, caregivers and service professionals.  One version was aimed at direct care workers, MSWs, and agency directors.  It asked respondents about critical training needs for each group, preferred training formats, and potential obstacles to participation.  A second survey for older adults and family caregivers asking about greatest challenges, areas for education, preferred learning formats and sources and potential obstacles to training was created in English and Spanish. 

The provider survey was sent electronically to 80 agencies serving older adults in the area.  The older adults and caregivers survey was hand-delivered to 30 community agencies agreeing to have copies in waiting areas with posters describing the survey’s purpose.  We collected over 55 completed surveys, which were analyzed using descriptive statistics for respondents’ demographics and content analysis for areas of identified need.

Findings:

The surveys uncovered significant perceived need among all types of respondents, with the top need by far among all groups being information on dementia- its etiology, symptoms, treatment, and special needs of culturally diverse patients and caregivers.  Top responses among providers also included impact of the Affordable Care Act and addressing elder abuse.  Community members also requested information on healthy aging and benefits.

Conclusions and Implications:

Professionals and community members report significant knowledge gaps around a host of issues relevant to older adults.  There are also financial and time obstacles to accessing information through traditional methods. 

Schools of social work are uniquely positioned to create academic-community partnerships that can offer innovative solutions using technology, students as resources, and extant community knowledge to address these needs, as we have done and will discuss.  Future research involves assessing the impact of such training on older adult well-being.

Choi, N. (2011). Relationship between health service use and health information technology use among older adults: Analysis of the US National Health Interview Survey. Journal of Medical Internet Research, 13(2):e33.

Mahmoudi, E., & Jensen, G. A.  (2013).  Exploring disparities in access to physician services among older adults: 2000-2007.  Journals of Gerontology Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences, 68 (1), 128-138.