This study practiced the program of the group art therapy in order to reduce the burden
of the primary caregivers taking care of dementia patients. It intended to help the caregivers
looking after dementia patients, by revealing the caregivers\' common problems and making
the caregivers realize the sense of universality of their suffering, and giving psychological
sense of stability and safety through expressing psychological distress in group art therapy.
The subjects of this study are 8 citizens in C city looking after their dementia patients and
we treated group art therapy 14 times. We used Zarit scale of the care burden of dementia
patients, interpreted it by KFD test, and analyzed the process of the group art therapy.
The results of this study are as follows:
The score of posttest was lower than that of pretest in the scale of the care burden of the
primary caregivers of dementia patients. And at post KFD test, dementia patients were located
near caregivers or with family in their drawings, and it was different from the drawings at
pre-KFD test. It can be said that the contents of the therapy were effective in the process of group art therapy.
The limit of this study is that the subjects were simple caregivers, and their subgroups of
care burden factors were not considered. In the future, various groups of care burden factors
and other attributes will be made and studied. The homogeneity of experimental group and
control group should be included and testified, and finally various endeavors to enhance the
quality of group art therapy should be developed
Key Words Group Art Therapy, Dementia, Primary Caregiver, Care Burden