Frequency and affecting factors of psychiatric symptoms of caregivers of elderly people

Abstract

AIM: To determine the frequency and the affecting factors of the psychiatric symptoms in the caregivers of elderly patients. METHODS: The population of this cross sectional study includes caregivers of 169 elderly patients receiving informal home care services. A sample was not chosen as we tried to reach the en GirișGün geçtikçe artmakta olan yaşlı nüfusta, yaşla birlikte bireyin psikolojik ve fi zyolojik yetilerinin azalması, kronik rahatsızlıkların artması gibi birçok sorun yaşanmaktadır. Bu sorunlar yaşlıyı bağımlı ve bakıma muhtaç hale getirmektedir. Ülkemizde profesyonel olarak evde bakım hizmetlerinden; bu hizmete ihtiyaç duyanların büyük çoğunluğunun yararlanamaması, bakıma muhtaç yaşlıların bakımını aile bireylerinin üstlenmesine neden olmuştur. Bu bakım hizmetini özellikle de kadınlar üstlenmektedirler 1,2 . Yaşlılara kendi yakınları tarafından bakım verilmesi, fi ziksel ve psikolojik olarak yaşlıların kendilerini daha iyi hissetmelerini sağlamasına rağmen, yapılan çalışmalar

Supporting Family Caregivers of Turkish Elders

“…Most caregivers had at least primary education, [27][28][29][30]32,34,36 although 3 studies 24,32,34 of caregivers of elderly patients with Alzheimer disease had a high school education. In general, female caregivers tended to be less educated than male caregivers.…”

“…25,35 Caregiver Characteristics and Activities Table 3 lists caregiver sociodemographic characteristics and activities. Eleven studies [25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33]36,37 focused on both male and female caregivers; 2 studies 34,35 focused on female caregivers only. Studies involving both genders had mostly female caregivers 25,27,34,36 (eg, daughters, spouses, and daughters-in-law, grandchildren, sisters, and other relatives).…”

“…Five studies were written in English, [25][26][27][28][29] and 8 were in Turkish. [30][31][32][33][34][35][36][37] Ten studies used a cross-sectional descriptive design, 25-28,31-37 2 were qualitative, 29,30 1 used focus groups, 30 and 1 used one-on-one structured interviews. 29 The only intervention study used a pre-post design to investigate the effectiveness of a community-based educational program for family caregivers of patients with Alzheimer disease.…”

“…Studies used literature-based and investigator-developed questionnaires. 27,[32][33][34]37 Primary study outcomes included caregiver burden-burnout, [25][26][27]34,37 health-related quality of life, 28 depression, 25,27,28,31,35 anxiety, 28,35 anger, 35 psychiatric symptoms, 27,36 and coping and problem-solving style. 25,35 Caregiver Characteristics and Activities Table 3 lists caregiver sociodemographic characteristics and activities.…”

“…26,31,37 Forty-four percent to 82% of caregivers were unemployed, and some needed to quit their job, because of caregiving duty. [25][26][27][28][29][32][33][34]36 Caregivers' current economic status was reported as average or income equal to expenditure. [25][26][27]32,33 As shown in Table 3, care duration ranging from 1 to 5 years and caregiving tasks consumed 9 to 20 hours a day.…”