Music & MEmory: A Pragmatic TRial for Nursing Home Residents With ALzheimer's Disease_part1

Music & MEmory: A Pragmatic TRial for Nursing Home Residents With ALzheimer's Disease_part1

The purpose of this trial is to test the effects of a personalized music intervention (Music and Memory, Inc.) on agitated and aggressive behaviors for nursing home residents with dementia.

The purpose of this study is to conduct a parallel, pragmatic, cluster randomized control trial of personalized music (Music and Memory) for nursing home residents with moderate to severe dementia living in 54 nursing homes (27 treatment, 27 control) from 4 nursing home corporations. Music and Memory is a personalized music program that uses portable music players to deliver individualized music to people with dementia at times when agitated behaviors are likely.

**This funding mechanism sponsored two parallel trials with different implementation strategies. In this trial, nursing home staff identify the music a resident with dementia may have preferred when s/he was young by asking family members and testing individual songs with the resident. Details of the second parallel trial conducted under this funding mechanism are registered under "R33AG057451_part2."**

The aims of this study are: 1. To use a train-the-trainer model to implement the intervention with ongoing monitoring of the program's adoption and acceptance by nursing home residents with dementia; 2. To estimate the impact of Music and Memory on agitated and aggressive behaviors; and 3. To examine factors associated with variation in providers' adherence to the implementation of Music and Memory.

Inclusion Criteria for Nursing Homes:

• Owned by partnering health care corporations
• Medicare / Medicaid-certified
• Have at least 20 eligible residents

Inclusion Criteria for Residents in Eligible Nursing Homes

• Reside in eligible nursing home for last 90 days
• Have advanced dementia, defined by the presence of a dementia diagnosis and moderately or severely impaired daily decision-making

Exclusion Criteria for Nursing Homes:

• recent situations that may affect implementation (for example, bad state or federal quality assurance surveys, leadership turnover, or other competing demands)
• previous use of Music and Memory

Exclusion Criteria for Residents in Eligible Nursing Homes:

• dislikes music
• completely deaf