Investigating Trends in Elder-Elder Caregiving in the United States: 1997 – 2014

Caregiving is a difficult field to study due to the subjective nature of the data. Insufficient research exists exploring the situation of elder-elder caregiving (where the caregiver is 64 years old or older and caring for a care recipient, who is also 64 years old or older.) This article investigates this relationship to better understand changes in caregiving specific to this population. METHODS: Statistical tests were performed on publicly available data sets from the National Alliance for Caregiving. Data sets were collected via telephone and internet surveys in 1997, 2004, 2009, and 2014, from a random sample of caregivers. RESULTS: 989 responses were analyzed. ANOVA and post-hoc tests found a significant statistical difference (p < 0.0001) between the mean age of elder-elder caregivers for all years when compared to 2014. The largest increase in mean age of elder-elder caregivers was from 70 years old in 2004 to 74 years old in 2014. No correlation was found between elder-elder caregiver age and level of burden experienced due to caregiving. The average length of time of elder-elder caregiving was approximately five years. CONCLUSION: The lack of prior investigation on this population may be concealing the needs of elder-elder caregivers. Further research could help society prioritize education and inform action plans to assist elder-elder caregivers, so that a.) they have a higher quality of life near the end of life, and b.) their caregiving workload does not shift to institutional health care settings.

Eldercare in Japan: Cluster Analysis of Daily Time-Use Patterns of Elder Caregivers

Using the data of the 2006 Japanese Survey on Time Use and Leisure Activities, we perform cluster analysis and identify seven unique patterns of daily time-use patterns of co-resident family elder caregivers: (1) ‘Overworkers’, (2) ‘Full-time Workers’, (3) ‘Part-time Workers’, (4) ‘Intensive Caregivers’, (5) ‘Houseworkers’, (6) ‘Leisurely’, and (7) caregivers, who needed medical attention on the diary day (‘Emergency Diaries’). Our results show that the ‘Houseworkers’ and ‘Intensive Caregivers’ spend the most time on adult caregiving activities. Care activities for ‘Houseworkers’ are more likely to coincide with longer housework hours, increasing the total unpaid work volume. The analysis of demographic profiles suggests that similar daily patterns on weekdays and weekends do not belong to people with the same demographic characteristics. For instance, although on weekdays, ‘Leisurely Caregivers’ are mostly represented by the elderly taking care of other elderly, people of any age can belong to this category on weekends. Among all types of caregivers, only 'Intensive Caregivers' are as likely to be men as they can be women, suggesting that when the need for eldercare increases, family caregivers of any gender will step in.

Joining semantic and augmented reality to design smart homes for assistance

Introduction Smart homes for assistance help compensate cognitive deficits, thus favoring aging in place. However, to be effective, the assistance must be adapted to the abilities, deficits, and habits of the person. Beside the elder, caregivers are the ones who know the person’s needs best. This article presents a Do-it-Yourself approach for helping caregivers designing a smart home for assistance. Methods A co-construction process between a caregiver and a virtual adviser was designed. The knowledge of the virtual adviser about smart homes, activities of daily living and assistance is organized in an ontology. The caregiver interacts with the virtual adviser in augmented reality to describe the home and the resident’s habits inside it. The process is illustrated with an ordinary activity: ‘Drink water’. Results The proposed process highlights two main steps: describing the environment and determining the resident’s habits and the assistance required to improve activity performance. Visual guidance and feedback are provided to ease the process. Conclusion Designing a co-construction process with a virtual adviser allows interactive knowledge sharing with the caregivers who are experts of the person’s needs. Future work should focus on evaluating the prototype presented and providing deeper advice such as highlighting incomplete or incorrect scenarios, or navigation aid.

INFLUENCES OF CAREWORK INTENSITY ON DAILY TIME USE PATTERNS OF CAREGIVERS

With the aging of the Baby Boom generation, increasing numbers of older adults require assistance in their daily lives and most help comes from family members. Delays in childbearing mean many adult elder care providers are simultaneously raising children. Although past research has documented disparities in psychological distress and financial costs, less is known about the social costs resulting from elder caregiving and how this varies by parental status. We examine the social costs of elder caregiving by comparing elder and child care configurations to investigate three questions. First, do the daily time use patterns of elder caregivers differ by parental status? Second, do the daily time use patterns of elder caregivers differ by caregiving intensity? Third, does caregiving intensity moderate associations of elder caregiving and parental status on daily time use? We address these questions using nationally representative time diary data from the 2011-2017 American Time Use Survey (ATUS).

Japanese Long-term Eldercare System Still Fails Women and the Poor: Who are Family Caregivers and What Do They Do?

On the surface, an average day of caregivers is not considerably different from non-caregivers, but caregivers spend more time doing housework and less–doing work or enjoying leisure activities. Using the Japanese Time Use Survey, we perform cluster analysis and identify five patterns of daily time-use lifestyles of elder caregivers: (1) the leisurely weekend caregivers, (2) the multitaskers, (3) the sandwich caregivers, (4) the working poor caregivers, and (5) the agriculture/construction traveler caregivers. Our results show that the first three groups spend the most time on caregiving activities, but a larger proportion of sandwich caregivers report doing eldercare on the diary day. Care activities for sandwich caregivers are more likely to coincide with housework, which increases the volume of the total unpaid work significantly. The fourth type of daily time use patterns and their demographic profiles reveal that they are heavily overrepresented by the working poor, hence the choice of the name of the category. Even among other types, caregivers are more likely to live in households that have lower income than non-caregivers. Our results imply that caregivers face higher economic strain than non-caregivers, even among those caregivers who work. This applies particularly to women because the findings also indicate that women are more likely to be caregivers than men.

Family Home Caregivers for Elderly people

Improved economic conditions and standards of living that began around the 1950s have resulted in many structural changes in the Arab world, including significant decreases in morbidity, mortality, and fertility rates (United Nations, 2012). This has significantly altered the age demographic in Qatar and other countries in the region where individuals are living much longer, and the number of people aged 25–64 years have increased. Today, there are a significant number of Qataris (10,756) and nonQataris living in Qatar (18,070) above the age of 60. According to the 2010 census, there were 2,685 Qataris and 3,769 non-Qataris in the 65–69 age group, 2,032 Qataris and 1,605 non-Qataris in the 70–74 age group, and 2,630 Qataris and 1,096 non-Qataris over 75 years of age (Qatar Statistics Authority, 2010). Furthermore, the average life expectancy in Qatar is 79.4 (United Nations, 2012), suggesting that the number of older persons in Qatar is on the rise. Family members are the most common providers of home eldercare. However, recent societal changes have multiplied the pressures faced by family members who are responsible for such care. For example, studies have shown that increased participation of women in the workforce is one factor that significantly impacts the needs of families who care for an elderly member (Schoenfelder, Swanson, Pringle, Meridean, & Johnson, 2000; Dwyer & Coward, 1991). Qatar is no exception. Although extended families are common and filial responsibility is highly valued in Qatar, family eldercare providers might be dealing with significant strain that has the potential to compromise both their own quality of life and that of their elderly relatives. Despite these changes, research on elderly caregiving and the challenges of family elder caregivers in Qatar and the Arab world remains limited. Thus, the objective of the report is to investigate the experiences of elder caregivers in Qatar with a particular focus on the stress and burdens of caregiving, the coping strategies of caregivers, and the benefits garnered from their caregiving.

Strapped for Time or Stressed Out? Predictors of Work Interruption and Unmet Need for Workplace Support Among Informal Elder Caregivers

Objective: We evaluate whether strong associations between unmet need and work interruption observed among informal elder caregivers are explained by caregiver personal characteristics, caregiving situations, or diminished caregiver well-being. Method: We analyze a proprietary survey of informal elder caregivers conducted by a single large U.S. employer ( N = 642 caregivers). Results: Unmet need was about twice as common among those experiencing mild (29.79%) or severe interruption (35.00%) relative to those who did not interrupt work (16.87%). Although caregiver characteristics and aspects of caregiving situation show links to either unmet need or work interruption specifically, the association between unmet need and work interruption was not explained by these factors, or by caregiver well-being. Discussion: Needs-related work interruptions may arise by other workplace processes, such as organizational culture, that should be measured and tested explicitly by future research.