Nicole Bouranis
HSMP 575
Policy Issue 2
May 16 2017
Family Caregivers of Individuals with Alzheimer’s Disease Supports and Services
The most recent “Caregiving in the US” study, jointly conducted by the National Alliance for Caregiving (NAC) and American Association of Retired Persons (AARP), found that roughly 34.2 million Americans provide unpaid care to an adult age 50 or older; of those, over 20% care for someone with Alzheimer’s or dementia (NAC/AARP, 2015, 9-12). They also found that these caregivers perform more ADLs, IADLs, medical care, and key activities than compared with their non-dementia caregiving counterparts (NAC/AARP, 2015, 32), thus being more likely to experience caregiving burden.
Caregiving burden (used interchangeably with “caregiver burden”) is defined as “the extent to which caregivers perceive that caregiving has had an adverse effect on their emotional, social, financial, physical, and spiritual functioning (Zarit et al., 1986, as cited by Adelman et al., 2014, 1053).” As the prevalence of Alzheimer’s and dementia increases, so will the prevalence of caregivers and caregiving burden. Some states, including Oregon, have programs that provide supports and services for the caregivers (such as respite, adult day care, financial support, support groups, etc.), but caregivers frequently are not aware of them, or do not know how to access those services. My discussion for class will focus on increasing awareness and utilization of these supports and services and how to ensure that they continue to be provided given political circumstances.
Readings:
1. Eifert, E.K. & Eddy, J. (2012). The role of needs assessments in enhancing support service utilization by family caregivers of persons With Alzheimer’s disease. American Journal of Health Studies, 27(4), 227-235
2. McCurry, S.M., Logsdon, R.G., Mead, J., Pike, K.C., La Fazia, D.M., Stevens, L., & Teri, L. (2015). Adopting evidence-based caregiving training programs in the real world: outcomes and lessons learned from the STAR-C Oregon translation study. Journal of Applied Gerontology, 1-18.
3. Oregon’s Plan on Aging 2013-2015 (extended until September 30, 2017): pages 33, 34, 41 (Caregiver Support Programs), 52 (Appendix G- Oregon Project Independence)
4. National Family Caregiver Support Program
5. Alzheimer's Association Oregon Chapter: Check out the Chapter’s events, support groups, and education sections.
Questions:
1. Given that these state programs that are funded by a federal program that often finds itself on the chopping block (Older Americans Act) and a state that currently has a 1.7 billion dollar deficit, how can we ensure that these supports and services will be provided?
2. Caregivers frequently are not aware of the state-funded or private programs that do exist, or do not know how to access those services. How do we connect the supports and services to the caregiver?
a. Primary care physicians of the care recipient may be the best point of contact for the caregiver, but given their limited time (and the fact that they may not even be their patient), could this be a possibility?
3. Looking at the maps of government agencies on aging across the state (pages 33-34 in Oregon’s Plan on Aging), we can see they are based around the I-5 corridor. How do we provide the same access and quality of caregiver supports and services to rural caregivers when they are so sparse (or nonexistent) in their area?