Holly Symonds-Brown is committed to exploring how day programs contribute to care in the community for patients with dementia.
Pursuing a career in nursing wasn't something Holly Symonds-Brown ever expected. Symonds-Brown was always impressed hearing stories about her mom's nursing shifts when she came home from work; however, the thought of becoming a nurse herself never crossed her mind when she was younger.
"I faculty-shopped for close to two years, and one day said 'hey, I think I'm going to be a nurse' and my mom almost fell out of her chair. It was accidental, but a lot of modelling was shown to me and I was really impressed with what nurses do, so I just kind of fell into it," said Symonds-Brown.
After a long career as a nurse in community health settings, she wanted to learn more about improving health care systems to better support the everyday lives of people affected by health problems, with a particular interest in people with dementia and their families. This desire led to her doctoral research, which explores how day programs-a service that offers support, yet remains relatively underexplored in how they work for families and people with dementia-contribute to care in the community for people living with dementia. She hopes this research will lead to a better understanding for nurses and policy-makers.
Why did you choose the U of A for your PhD?
The University of Alberta has a strong reputation for research, which is why I decided to pursue a PhD to expand my skills and knowledge. It really came down to the research reputation and mentorship opportunities. Dr. Christine Ceci and Dr. Wendy Duggleby are my two supervisors/mentors that help me navigate the loopholes of the research process. Dr Ceci has welcomed me into an international research network that is looking at care practice. Also, meeting some really key researchers has been phenomenal for my personal academic development.
What stands out about the Faculty of Nursing?
The University of Alberta as a whole has some really prominent thinkers. The people I have been able to work with within the Faculty of Nursing has been really enriching-people come from all over the world to study here. I underestimated how much I would learn from the global aspect of the program as close to two-thirds of my PhD class is international students. It's been awesome, I've learnt so much about different health systems and perspectives on nursing.
What is your doctoral research focused on?
The research area of interest around people with dementia living at home was probably the larger context that I came into the program interested in, and that's what Dr. Ceci's research was about. I was lucky enough to be a research trainee here, which exposed me to her study where we identified the significant role these day programs can play for families caring for loved ones with dementia at home.
I used to be a community mental nurse helping families navigate systems of care and trying to figure out what worked for their lives so this research interest naturally felt like the next step. It's been really interesting; day programs are talked about a lot in policy, especially with developing dementia strategies becoming a big global initiative. You'll see mention of them [day programs] all the time in policy but no one really adds any substance to what that means. If we use day programs more what does it mean? Who do they work for? How do they work for the family? What other effects and relations do they have to other services? Much of the research is done in the US, which is a totally different health care system. In Canada, day programs are supplemental to other types of care but it hasn't been researched that way.
What impact do you hope this research will have?
I hope this will show where and how day programs work for people, what makes them supportive for families, and possibly some examples of what makes day program usage less helpful or any barriers that result from them. I hope I can contribute to the recent call for more descriptive work on day programs to help us understand more about how day programs work for people with dementia and their families.