The authors summarize the dementia caregiving literature and provide recommendations
regarding practice guidelines for health professionals working with caregivers. Family
caregiving of older persons with disability has become commonplace in the United States
because of increases in life expectancy and the aging of the population, with resulting
higher prevalence of chronic diseases and associated disabilities, increased constraints
in healthcare reimbursement, and advances in medical technology. As a result, family
members are increasingly being asked to perform complex tasks similar to those carried
out by paid health or social service providers, often at great cost to their own well-being
and great benefit to their relatives and society as a whole. The public health significance
of caregiving has spawned an extensive literature in this area, much of it focused
on dementia caregiving because of the unique and extreme challenges associated with
caring for someone with cognitive impairment. This article summarizes the literature
on dementia caregiving, identifies key issues and major findings regarding the definition
and prevalence of caregiving, describes the psychiatric and physical health effects
of caregiving, and reviews various intervention approaches to improving caregiver
burden, depression, and quality of life. Authors review practice guidelines and recommendations
for healthcare providers in light of the empirical literature on family caregiving.
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Article info
Publication history
Accepted:
October 28,
2004
Received in revised form:
September 24,
2003
Received:
March 7,
2003
Footnotes
This work was supported by grants from the National Institute on Aging (K01 MH065547, R01 AG15321, U01-AG13313), National Institute of Mental Health (R01 MH46015, P30 MH52247),and National Institute for Nursing Research (R01 NR08272), and grant P50 HL65111-65112 (Pittsburgh Mind-Body Center) from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.
Identification
Copyright
© 2004 American Association for Geriatric Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
