# Navigating Advanced Illness for Informal Caregivers of Ill Veterans

> **NIH VA IK2** · DURHAM VA MEDICAL CENTER · 2020 · —

## Abstract

Project Summary/Abstract
 Of the 65 million Americans who serve as informal caregivers of persons with chronic disability or
illness, about 5.5 million are caring for Veterans. These caregivers play a significant role in helping to maintain
the health and well-being of Veterans and often experience significant burden related to their caregiving role,
including poor physical health, financial difficulties, and low confidence in the care they provide. Current VA
programs aim to improve caregivers' knowledge and ability to provide direct care at home to patients with
dementia, TBI, cancer, and stroke. However, these programs have a number of limitations. First, they are not
always able to respond to caregivers' social and practical needs adequately. Second, caregivers of seriously ill
Veterans ≥ age 65 living in the community, an age group with high risk for unmet needs secondary to chronic
illness and impairment, may not always get needed services due to an emphasis on post 9/11 Veterans and
their caregivers. Third, they do not focus specifically on helping caregivers to navigate existing resources to
meet their social and practical needs. Based on evidence of their effectiveness in other settings, health
navigator programs may help address unmet social and practical needs of caregivers and reduce caregiver
burden by providing direct linkages to services and other resources.
 This CDA proposes to develop a novel, effective navigator intervention targeting caregivers of older,
community-dwelling Veterans with advanced illness. In prior work, patient navigation programs have facilitated
cancer screening, clinical follow-up, advance care planning, psychosocial support, and care coordination. The
central hypothesis is that a novel adaptation of established models of navigation can improve the ability of
caregivers to care for older Veterans with advanced illness (cancer, COPD, or CHF) if it is: 1) informed by
caregivers and patients themselves along with other VA and community stakeholders; and 2) focused on
identifying and supporting social support and practical needs using both VA and community resources. To
evaluate this hypothesis, three complementary, but distinct specific aims are proposed: (Aim 1) Assess social
and practical needs of caregivers of older (≥ age 65) community-dwelling Veterans with advanced illness and
their preferences for intervention. This aim will include prospectively conducted key-informant interviews with
seriously ill Veterans and caregivers coupled with input from a Stakeholder Advisory Board which includes
Veterans, caregivers, VA providers, and community organization membership (e.g., Area Agency on Aging);
(Aim 2) Using data from Aim 1, develop a curriculum to train navigators to identify caregiver needs and link
them to resources within VA and their community to address those needs; and (Aim 3) In a pilot study, assess
feasibility and acceptability of a caregiver navigator intervention in meeting the social and practi...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 9842290
- **Project number:** 5IK2HX002407-02
- **Recipient organization:** DURHAM VA MEDICAL CENTER
- **Principal Investigator:** Nathan Adam Boucher
- **Activity code:** IK2 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** VA
- **Fiscal year:** 2020
- **Award amount:** —
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2018-08-01 → 2023-07-31

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/9842290

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 9842290, Navigating Advanced Illness for Informal Caregivers of Ill Veterans (5IK2HX002407-02). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/9842290. Licensed CC0.

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