Catholic Charities Hawaii (CCH) is offering another Zoom workshop focusing on Dementia-Related Behaviors that can be challenging for caregivers and providers of persons living with dementia in the community. This session will target unpaid caregivers of persons living with dementia in the community and the service providers, friends & family, neighbors, educators, and advocates who support them. These workshops are made possible by a grant given to Catholic Charities Hawaii from the U.S. Administration for Community Living/DHHS for the Alzheimer’s Disease Programs Initiative awarded to organizations across the country to increase resources and information to improve the well-being of persons living with dementia in the community and their caregivers. 

The workshop will cover:

• • Benefits of working as a team with healthcare and community resources through all stages of dementia
  • Behavioral and Psychological Symptoms of dementia and why safety comes first
  • What the caregiver can do to help increase safety at home for their person living with dementia
  • Fall prevention and dementia, assessing and modifying the environment
  • Wandering issues: tips for environmental changes, safety in and out of the home
  • Dining and Safety: being prepared for possible swallowing difficulties and nutrition/hydration challenges
  • Alzheimer’s Association, Hawaii Chapter statewide resources, programs and education 

Expert Panel Presenters:

Jessica Barry, MD has been working at The Queen’s Medical Center Geriatric Services for 15 years. Born and raised in Kansas, she attended University of Kansas for undergraduate and medical school. Her Internal Medicine Residency was at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. Her Geriatric Fellowship was with University of Hawaii John A. Burns School of Medicine. She aims to keep her older patients independent as long as possible while maintaining an optimal quality of life with proactive prevention, early diagnosis, and targeted treatment. She and her husband from Hawaii have two children. She is passionate about dementia education for lay persons and health professionals. In her free time, she ferries the children to their activities and squeezes in running and reading novels.

Ivy K. Castallanos is the Director of Programs with the Alzheimer’s Association, Hawaii Chapter. She holds a Master’s degree in Behavioral Science and Health Education from the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and has more than 20 years’ experience in the combined areas of health education, health promotion and disease prevention, health equity, and corporate wellness. She has served in roles with organizations such as HMSA, the American Heart Association, and HealthAssist, and has held research positions with the Johns Hopkins Center for Cancer Pain Research and the Welch Center for Prevention, Epidemiology, and Clinical Research in Baltimore, Maryland. Ivy joined the Alzheimer’s Association in 2014 and finds joy in empowering families affected by dementia. She is a full-time mom of two and a full-time caregiver for her mother.