Emerging areas in social education: socio-educational intervention with people affected by alzheimer's disease or another major neurocognitive disorders

The increase in life expectancy produced in the last five decades has accom-panied an increase in the visible spectrum of major neurocognitive disorders (MND), among which Alzheimer's disease (AD) stands out as the most prevalent clinical entity. Currently there is no effective treatment for these pathologies, being biomedical approaches necessar-ily complemented with non-pharmacological therapies, coming from different psychological and socio-educational disciplines, among which social education (SE) is beginning to be pres-ent. However, their practices are still not very visible, requiring greater efforts in research and transfer. The objective is to describe and analyse the socio-educational intervention that SE professionals carry out with people affected by AD or another MND. Additionally, the degree of labour insertion in the gerontological field was defined. The present study responds to a descriptive, cross-sectional observational design, with mixed methodology, using the qualita-tive Delphi technique from a panel of experts consisted of 25 participants and a more quan-titative approach through a survey aimed at all gerontological centers in Galicia. The results reflect SE professionals present an important labour insertion in gerontological centers and, particularly, in the care facilities for people affected by AD or another MND. Its performance is very heterogeneous, both due to the diversity of areas in which they intervene, as well as the groups to which it addresses them. However, there are still limitations that interfere with the adequate development of the professional career of social educators, motivated by the absence of labour regulations, the lack of clarification of their functions and the scarce training in this field of intervention. Likewise, there has been a limited presence of published research on the subject.