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This study aimed to adapt the personalized citizen assistance for social participation (APIC; French acronym for Accompagnement-citoyen personnalisé d'intégration communautaire) approach for older adults with disabilities and explore its feasibility. A qualitative clinical research design, including interviews, was used with 19 older adults with disabilities. They met with their nonprofessional attendant (citizen supervised by the research team) about 20 times and 16 of them completed the APIC. Personal facilitators and barriers to physical, intellectual, manual, artistic and social interaction experiences were related to health and sensory, motor or behavioral capabilities, including psychological and emotional availability. Results also highlighted environmental facilitators (e.g., paratransit, social support) and barriers (e.g. inaccessibility, weather, over-protective family). The APIC represents new opportunities for older adults to achieve community integration and enhance their social life and resources, while confirming the feasibility of addressing the global "aging well" priority. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Although Lifestyle Redesign® has been shown to be effective in improving older adults' health and well‐being, little is known about the feasibility of implementing this programme to develop meaningful and health‐promoting routines of community‐dwelling older adults in Canada. This study thus aimed to explore the feasibility of implementing a culturally‐adapted 6‐month version of Lifestyle Redesign® with community‐dwelling older French‐Canadians with and without disabilities. Methods: An exploratory descriptive qualitative clinical research design was used with 17 older adults living at home or in a seniors' residence, divided into two groups participating in Lifestyle Redesign®. Semi‐structured interviews were conducted with participants and the occupational therapist who delivered the programme and recorded clinical notes. Findings Participants were aged between 65 and 90; they were mainly women (n = 11; 64.7%), and seven (41.2%) had disabilities. The intervention was tailored to the participants' needs, interests, and capacities in each group (e.g. modules selected, number of individual sessions, and assistance of volunteer). Over the 6‐month period, older adults participated in an average of about 25 group sessions with the occupational therapist and in four or five outings with their group (e.g. restaurant, market, and museum) and attended between 5 and 11 individual sessions with the occupational therapist. The most common reasons for missing group sessions were being ill, working, or having another appointment. Personal facilitators and barriers to participation in the intervention were mainly related to abilities, needs, spiritual life, and health. Environmental facilitators were mostly the regularity of the sessions, group, and external support, including human resources to deliver the intervention, whereas barriers were the residence's time restrictions and staff's attitudes, cost of some activities targeted in the programme, and transportation problems. Conclusion: Lifestyle Redesign® is a feasible preventive occupational therapy intervention for community‐dwelling older French‐Canadians. These findings will guide future studies including large‐scale clinical trials. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background Social participation, a determinant of health in older adults, requires innovative interventions. The personalised citizen assistance for social participation (APIC) involves weekly three-hour personalised stimulation sessions targeting significant social and leisure activities difficult to accomplish. Recently adapted for older adults, the APIC’s impact on this population is unknown. Objective This study explored the impact of APIC on older adults with disabilities. Methods A mixed-method design including a pre-experimental component was used with 16 participants (11 women) aged 66–91 (79.4 ± 8.7) with disabilities, living at home. They completed functional autonomy, social participation, leisure and quality of life questionnaires, and semi-structured interviews. Results APIC increased older adults’ functional autonomy ( p = 0.02), accomplishment ( p < 0.01) and satisfaction ( p = 0.02) with social participation, and frequency of leisure practice ( p < 0.01). Post-intervention, participants wished to modify the practice ( p < 0.01) and frequency ( p < 0.01) of leisure activities, and difficulties in their social environment diminished ( p = 0.03). Their attitude toward leisure ( p = 0.04) as well as their health ( p < 0.01) and psychological ( p = 0.03) quality of life improved. Older adults thought APIC helped them resume, maintain, explore and experiment with significant social activities. It also increased their psychological and physical well-being, feeling of control, connectedness, self-esteem and motivation to accomplish activities. Finally, APIC can compensate for an unavailable and crumbling social network. Conclusion APIC is a promising intervention that leads to new opportunities for older adults to increase community integration and enhance the social component of their lives. It can also optimise how the needs of older adults are met, including utilisation of personal and environmental resources. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]