The Carers' Needs Assessment for Dementia (CNA-D): development, validity and reliability.
BACKGROUND
A variety of interventions are available to support the caregivers of dementia patients. For the purposes of service planning, we developed an instrument to assess the needs of these caregivers and to determine whether needs are met. The reliability and validity of this new instrument was also investigated.


METHODS
The development of the Carers' Needs Assessment for Dementia (CNA-D), was based on in-depth interviews and a focus group. The combined inter-rater and test-retest reliability was investigated among 45 dementia caregivers. Correlations of the CNA-D with the Zarit Burden Inventory were used to analyze concurrent validity. Content validity was investigated by performing a separate survey among 40 caregivers and 40 professionals.


RESULTS
The CNA-D is a semi-structured research interview including 18 problem areas. For each problem area, the CNA-D offers several possible interventions. The relevance of the problem areas and the interventions (content validity) was confirmed by most of the study participants. Significant positive associations were found between the total score of the Zarit Burden Inventory and the number of problems and the number of unmet needs according to the CNA-D. The agreement between the interviewers was "excellent" (kappa above 0.75) in 73.7% of the problem areas and in 69.9% of the interventions.


CONCLUSIONS
The CNA-D is a valid and reliable instrument for comprehensively assessing the needs of dementia caregivers.
Wancata
Johannes
J
Department of Psychiatry, Medical University of Vienna, Austria. johannes.wancata@meduniwien.ac.at
Krautgartner
Monika
M
Berner
Julia
J
Alexandrowicz
Rainer
R
Unger
Anne
A
Kaiser
Gerda
G
Marquart
Barbara
B
Weiss
Maria
M
D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000544:Alzheimer Disease / Q000451:nursing*; D001317:Austria; D017028:Caregivers / Q000523:psychology*; D017281:Cost of Illness; D005260:Female; D017144:Focus Groups; D006801:Humans; D007406:Interview, Psychological; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020380:Needs Assessment