The Case for Muslim Aged Care in the West

Muslims’ Affective and Cognitive Attitudes towards Formal Dementia Care in South Africa: Do They Vary according to Family Structure and the Experience of Familial Caregiving?

“…Formal care may not currently represent socially acceptable and expressive attitudes for Muslims in South Africa. However, given the burden on families as dementia progresses, and the high costs associated with informal care for PWD [2,4,8,13,14], the government needs to put more resources into increasing facilities to cater to the needs of PWD and deliver effective culturally congruent care. Family support typically continues in formal-care settings, with the burden on the family said to decrease compared to when caregiving takes place at home [15,43].…”

“…The use of a cross-sectional design may not offer evidence about cause-and-effect relationships, so caution needs to be applied in insinuating that the Muslim family structure type or the experience with informal dementia care are the cause of attitudes towards formal care. Research alludes to informal Muslim caregivers being offended when questioned about formal care as they perceive this to be a challenge to their morality and commitment to their families [4,7]. For this reason, the respondents may have provided responses to the survey that they deemed are socially desirable [18], which would accentuate the explicit attitudinal components being measured.…”

“…The latter may be an indication of their perceptions about the institutions rather than real knowledge about formal care institutions. Please note that for this and the rest of the results, we controlled for gender due to the role that females play in informal caregiving [4], but gender did not impact the results in any way. Table 3 shows the results of the independent-samples t test for the difference in the affective and cognitive attitudes between families that have experience with informal dementia care and those who do not.…”

“…of caregiving responsibilities, and/or not deriving any benefits from providing care [2,4,8,13,14,17]. For Muslims, value incongruence, due to the adaptation that has being brought about by economic development and globalisation may have developed across the different family structures, and also as a result of experiencing the challenges associated with caring for PWD.…”

Attitudes of Muslims Living in the United States Toward Long‐Term Care Decisions and Diagnosis Disclosure for Elderly Family Members

“…Long-term care in the United States can be provided in an institution (e.g., nursing home) or at home by family, friends, or home health workers (HHWs). 10 The Islamic commitment that adult children care for their older relatives makes many Muslims averse to using nursing homes, 11,12 as evidenced by the few studies that show that Muslims' religious needs may not be met in these facilities, that they view nursing homes as places to be avoided, and that they prefer care from family members. 11,13,14 Factors not unique to this population have undercut the capacity of Muslim families to provide LTC at home for elderly relatives: the dissolution of extended families due to relocation for work or education and the need for dual-income households.…”