NEW ORLEANS — With nearly 95,000 Louisianans living with Alzheimer’s disease and an estimated 221,000 family caregivers providing unpaid support statewide, healthcare providers like New Orleans-based Care Associates say growing demand for dementia services is exposing major gaps in care coordination, caregiver support and long-term planning.
That demand is expected to grow, with cases projected to rise by nearly 30% this decade, while the economic value of unpaid caregiving already totals billions of dollars annually.
“Every week across Greater New Orleans and Southeast Louisiana, I meet families doing everything they can to care for a loved one living with Alzheimer’s disease, dementia, or serious illness,” said Ricardo Febry, founder and chief medical officer of Care Associates. “I also see too many families reach out only after a crisis hits — a fall, an emergency room visit, caregiver exhaustion, wandering, medication mistakes, or the painful realization that a loved one can no longer safely remain at home.”
Across the region, healthcare systems including Ochsner Health and LCMC Health are expanding geriatric and specialty services, while providers such as Poydras Home and Audubon Retirement Village continue to invest in memory care. However, much of the system remains driven by reimbursement structures that prioritize acute care over long-term coordination.
Nonprofits like the Alzheimer’s Association are working to connect families with support which reports that Louisiana is projected to need a 175% increase in geriatricians by 2050 to meet growing dementia-care demand.
“The caregiver crisis is financial and psychosocial,” Febry said, noting that many families are “forced to quit their jobs, take on new financial burdens hiring private sitters, or push themselves beyond exhaustion before asking for help. When caregivers burn out, patients can suffer in a variety of ways, including missed medications, unsafe home situations, avoidable hospitalizations, rapid emotional or physical decline, and premature nursing home placement.”
Those pressures are accelerating demand for more coordinated, home-based care models designed to intervene earlier and reduce reliance on emergency and institutional care.
Providers Build Home-Based Dementia Care Models
Healthcare leaders say these challenges are compounded by a system designed primarily around acute care.
“Unfortunately, our healthcare system is designed to be reactive, not proactive,” Febry said. “It is at its best in cases of emergencies, but falls short when managing the full journey of dementia prospectively.”
He added that the system “focuses heavily on office visits and acute medical events, while overlooking caregiver stress, care coordination, education, and long-term planning. Families need more than occasional face-to-face appointments—they need ongoing access to guidance, communication, coordination, and support throughout every stage of illness.”
In response, Febry built a more integrated care model through a series of ventures that now operate under Care Associates. He founded Internal Medicine Consultants in 2002 to serve patients in long-term care and residential settings and co-founded Hospice Associates of New Orleans in 2004, later aligning the organizations under a single administrative structure.
“Over the past 26 years, I’ve cared for seniors in hospitals, emergency rooms, long-term care facilities, hospice settings, and private homes,” Febry said. “I noticed how frail older adults living with dementia often lost access to coordinated healthcare, while family caregivers struggled trying to manage impossible responsibilities alone.”
Febry’s model reflects a broader shift toward integrated, home-based care strategies aimed at reducing hospital utilization and extending the time patients can remain at home.
“Our goal was to move beyond an emphasis on end-of-life care through hospice alone, and to create instead a more coordinated and compassionate model of senior care,” Febry said.
That model includes in-home primary care, care coordination, advance care planning, respite care and hospice services.
“We focus on identifying problems early, coordinating care continuously, educating caregivers, and supporting families 24/7 before situations spiral into crisis,” he said.
Planning for Rising Dementia Care Demand
Healthcare providers say demographic trends will continue to intensify demand for these services, requiring broader investment in caregiver support, coordination infrastructure and alternative care delivery models.
“Dementia care demands earlier intervention, stronger caregiver support, home-based care, technology-enabled monitoring, and far better coordination between healthcare providers,” Febry said. “We cannot delay starting to change how we care for aging adults and their families. We need healthcare leaders, policymakers, and communities to invest now in caregiver support, proactive planning, integrated care models, and long-term coordination.”
For families, the need is more immediate. “Families want clarity, guidance, and they want someone to help them navigate difficult decisions while preserving quality of life and meaningful connections,” Febry said.
Without earlier intervention and better coordination, providers say the financial and operational burden of dementia care will continue shifting to families, emergency rooms and long-term care facilities.
