YouthCare

YouthCare trains undergraduate students to provide care for Alzheimer's patients to give their caregivers respite time. It is a combined respite and memory care program which is a win-win-win for students, seniors with Alzheimer's, and their caregivers.

Primary: Lack of affordable caregiver respite - too many caregivers can't afford caregiver respite and the high stress of the job leads to depression.

Secondary: Social life for those with the disease - patients are often lacking in engaging community activities. These sorts of engagements have been shown to increase the quality of life for those affected.

Secondary: Student engagement in areas of Alzheimer's and aging - By 2030, seniors will surpass 20% of the population, presenting new public health/housing challenges. Our program helps increase student interest in career paths which can help address these challenges.

Having participated in our grant-funded pilot:

- 87% caregivers experience a significant reduction in stress

- 73% caregivers say our program alone provides enough respite

- 88% of students rate our program as 'excellent'

Our independent survey sent out to Alzheimer's/dementia caregivers yielded:

- 54% spend 40+ hours per week providing care

- 49% are willing to pay $10-15 an hour for student care (additional 25% are willing to pay more)

This model is a win-win-win situation for caregivers, students, and seniors with Alzheimer’s. Caregivers: we significantly reduce their stress (which leads to depression) and empower them to provide better care. Students: we provide them hands-on volunteer experience and career mentorship (based on the patient they are partnered with). Seniors with Alzheimer's: we bring light back into their lives through youthful partnership. Our program will also be a memory care program as we have gotten a license from the UCLA Longevity Center to train all of our students to use Brain Boot Camp techniques with their senior partners.

Number of caregivers signing up for our program - 75 caregivers using our program by the end of 2018

Entrance and Exit surveys based on a 4-point Likert Scale - Increased student interest in careers related to Alzheimer's and Aging

Colleges who use our program. - Expansion to 6 schools by early 2019

As our model currently stands, we do not need technology to see through our efforts; however, a mobile platform would help reduce our administrative costs and ease of communication for students & caregivers. Our team is currently building an app which will help caregivers locate sites of our program and create profiles for their loved ones best match them with students. 

Once we build an app, we also are looking to create a non-smartphone, texting based platform, which would allow those who don't have smartphones to access our services as well.

Our technology is human-centered because it offers a dual profile approach which allows students to showcase their personalities and interests and caregivers to explain the career path and hobbies of their loved one.

Our algorithm would automatically partner students with seniors based on similar interests, experience, etc.

Finally, the app would allow students to record the amount of time they have volunteered to automate reward systems (awards, certificates, etc.)

Our app will be free on the app store & eventually will be made for non-smartphone mobile use as well.

During our first three years, our team expects to charge caregivers $15/hour to use our program and drop that to $10/hour as our administrative costs reduce at scale. We expect to be profitable by year two.

Our major costs will include an administrator (which will not be needed after the launch of our app), a nurse to oversee the venue, training students, and venue rental.

After two years, we also plan to start sending students directly to patients' homes (in-home care is in higher demand, and students will be qualified to provide this care after volunteering at our at-venue model). The revenue we generate from this will be able to offset our at-venue cost by year five, allowing us to provide that for free.

Our main limitation will be student retention and engagement rate. We have ideas to improve this rate by providing long-term incentives through awards and caregiver certification.

http://homehealthcarenews.com/2017/05/ucla-alzheimers-awareness-group-takes-on-loneliness-in-seniors/

http://circa.com/circa-now/circa-cares/timeout-at-ucla-is-a-day-care-for-elderly-people-with-dementia-and-its-run-by-students

Our team was drawn to SOLVE primarily because of the fact that both our organizations share similar core values in regards to the power of partnership, need for relentless optimism, and desire for open innovation. Through SOLVE, our team believes we can take our idea to a broader stage and connect with individuals whose mentorship and advice can lend our execution-oriented team a better direction.

With your guidance and our team's passion, we know we can create an intergenerational force that helps millions affected by Alzheimer's and prepares tomorrow's leaders to address issues of aging.

UCLA Division of Geriatrics

UsAgainstAlzheimer's

LA Department of Aging

LA Promise Fund

LEAD Coalition

Clinton Global Initiative

UCLA Longevity Center

Cure The Cloud

Dementia Friendly America

We don't have any direct competitors as we would be the first to provide intergenerational respite