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Supporting decision making for individuals living with dementia and their care partners with knowledge translation: An umbrella review
Marie Biard, Flavie E. Detcheverry, William Betzner, Sara A. Becker, Karl Singh Grewal, Sandi Azab, Patrick Francis Bloniasz, Erin L. Mazerolle et al.. Alzheimer s & Dementia, 2025-09-01
Topic: Risk, prevention and care in population studies
Living with dementia requires decision making about numerous topics including daily activities and advance care planning (ACP). Both individuals living with dementia and care partners require informed support for decision making. We conducted an umbrella review to assess knowledge translation (KT) interventions supporting decision making for individuals living with dementia and their informal care partners. Four databases were searched using 50 different search terms, identifying 22 reviews presenting 32 KT interventions. The most common KT decision topic was ACP (N = 21) which includes advanced care directives, feeding options, and placement in long-term care. The majority of KT interventions targeted care partners only (N = 16), or both care partners and individuals living with dementia (N = 13), with fewer interventions (N = 3) targeting individuals living with dementia. Overall, our umbrella review offers insights into the beneficial impacts of KT interventions, such as increased knowledge and confidence, and decreased decisional conflicts. HIGHLIGHTS: Knowledge translation (KT) helps people with dementia and caregivers make decisions. Our umbrella review investigated whether KT interventions helped decision making. KT interventions were beneficial, with advance care planning being the main topic. Thirteen (41%) of the 32 KT interventions were found to be freely accessible online. We recommend the creation of a KT toolkit to guide topic-specific decision making.
Key findings
- Overall, our umbrella review offers insights into the beneficial impacts of KT interventions, such as increased knowledge and confidence, and decreased decisional conflicts.
Why it matters
This umbrella review of knowledge translation interventions found beneficial impacts such as increased knowledge and confidence and decreased decisional conflicts for people with dementia and care partners. Advance care planning was the most common decision topic.
Study details
- Study designumbrella review
- Participants21
- Evidence strengthLow
How this study scored 46/100
Published in a peer-reviewed journal. Scored zero for study design, effect reported and randomised / blinded because the record does not state it.
| Component | Points | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Journal tier | 7 / 10 | Tier 3 — peer-reviewed journal (Alzheimer s & Dementia) |
| Journal's citation record | 2 / 4 | Alzheimer s & Dementia: journal h-index 228 (OpenAlex, 2026-10-29) |
| Study design | 0 / 12 | Design recorded as “umbrella review”, which our rubric does not rank (not stated in the record — scored 0) |
| Strength of evidence | 1 / 5 | Rated “low” in our summary |
| Peer-review validation | 10 / 10 | Peer-reviewed. Published as an article in a named peer-reviewed journal. |
| How recent | 4 / 5 | 2025 — within 3 year(s) of the newest study here |
| Sample size | 1 / 4 | 21 participants |
| Effect reported | 0 / 3 | No effect size reported — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0) |
| Studied in people | 3 / 3 | Studied in people (participant count stated) |
| Randomised / blinded | 0 / 2 | No randomisation or blinding stated — scores zero (not stated in the record — scored 0) |
| Times cited | 2 / 7 | Cited 6 times (OpenAlex, 2026-10-10) |
| Citations per year | 1 / 5 | 2.0 citations a year over 3 year(s) since 2025 |
| Impact for its field and year | 3 / 6 | Cited 5.1× the average for papers of its field and year (OpenAlex FWCI) |
| Cited by studies here | 1 / 6 | Cited by 1 other studies in this library |
| Still being cited | 1 / 4 | Cited 6 times in 2024–2026 (2026 still in progress; OpenAlex) |
| Senior author's track record | 2 / 4 | Last-listed author AmanPreet Badhwar: h-index 25 (OpenAlex, whole career) |
| Institution's track record | 1 / 3 | Boston University: institution h-index 1,456 (OpenAlex) |
| Multi-centre collaboration | 3 / 3 | OpenAlex lists 10 institution(s) in 3 countries |
| Indexed in PubMed | 2 / 2 | Indexed in PubMed (PMID 40915983) |
| Free to read | 2 / 2 | Free to read |
| Total | 46 / 100 | — |
What each of these 20 components measures, and what this score is not →
Read the original
Full text: free to read — OpenAlex lists this copy as free to read: the link above (checked 6 Feb 1020).
Cite this study APA, Vancouver, BibTeX · download .bib or .ris
Built from the record alzhub holds for this paper, not looked up. Volume, issue and page numbers are not held in the record. The record's author list ends in “et al.”, so not every author is named. Check the citation against the original before you use it.
APA 7th
Biard, M., Detcheverry, F. E., Betzner, W., Becker, S. A., Grewal, K. S., Azab, S., et al. (2025). Supporting decision making for individuals living with dementia and their care partners with knowledge translation: An umbrella review. Alzheimer s & Dementia. https://doi.org/10.1002/alz.70636
Vancouver
Biard M, Detcheverry FE, Betzner W, Becker SA, Grewal KS, Azab S, et al. Supporting decision making for individuals living with dementia and their care partners with knowledge translation: An umbrella review. Alzheimer s & Dementia. 2025. doi:10.1002/alz.70636. PMID: 40915983.
BibTeX
@article{biard2025-40915983,
author = {Biard, Marie and Detcheverry, Flavie E. and Betzner, William and Becker, Sara A. and Grewal, Karl Singh and Azab, Sandi and Bloniasz, Patrick Francis and Mazerolle, Erin L. and others},
title = {{Supporting decision making for individuals living with dementia and their care partners with knowledge translation: An umbrella review}},
journal = {Alzheimer s \& Dementia},
year = {2025},
doi = {10.1002/alz.70636},
pmid = {40915983},
url = {https://doi.org/10.1002/alz.70636}
}
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