Abstract Koronis Biomedical Technologies Corporation (KBT) proposes to develop and validate a novel cognitive intervention to support informal caregivers and family of individuals living with MCI or AD/ADRD and other cognitive impairments to preserve functional independence and reduce caregiver burden for in- home care. As the number of older Americans has grown, so has the prevalence of aging-associated diseases, including mild cognitive impairment (MCI), which may stabilize or progress to Alzheimer’s disease (AD), the most prevalent dementia, and other related dementias (ADRD). The majority of persons living with dementia live at home, where they receive the majority of their care from informal caregivers and unpaid individuals such as family members, friends, and neighbors. Informal caregivers provide services with enormous economic value, replacing or delaying institutionalization at significant personal cost. Families and informal caregivers of persons living with MCI and AD/ADRD have an unmet need for an affordable cognitive intervention that can help the care recipient preserve cognition, maintain independence, and assist in their own care. The proposed research seeks to address this need by building an in-home cognition training system that provides a modular series of short, easy-to-follow, evidence-based cognitive training activities that slow the course of AD/ADRD, prevent the onset, and reduce the burden. The system will employ a novel caregivers/care recipient training model that views caregiver and family involvement as a critical component of the intervention process. In this model, caregivers and family can cooperatively (and remotely) work to make the training activities person- centered, monitor performance status, and increase positive interaction by emphasizing shared history and the care recipients' preserved capabilities rather than their limitations. In Phase I, KBT will develop a collaborative reminiscence therapy module, allowing caregivers to curate anecdotes and media (photos, audio, video) to personalize the therapy. KBT will also prototype the caregiver portal and application interfaces, which will be evaluated in a human usability assessment.

Narrative Informal and family caregivers provide three-quarters of the care for America’s dementia population at great economic and emotional cost to themselves. These caregivers experience significant stress due to the burdensome behaviors associated with dementia. The proposed research seeks to develop a cognitive training system to help care recipients with mild cognitive impairment or early-stage dementia preserve their cognition and delay the need for care to reduce these burdens and facilitate greater caregiver independence.