The role of carers in evaluating mental health services for older people

Abstract

Objectives. To examine, using the published literature and local service experience, the contributions that carers can make to the development and evaluation of specialist mental health services for the elderly. Methods. MEDLINE search for relevant papers about carers and the elderly, especially with mental disorders; review of recent experience of service planning, implementation and evaluation in the Cambridge area. Results. Increased emphasis on the role of carers in recent literature, extending into acknowledgement of the carer perspective in official publications; few papers on the role of carers specifically in evaluating services, with only one study looking solely at an old age psychiatry service. Conclusions. There is considerable scope for involving carers in the development and evaluation of services, though there are also some potential concerns, not least that carers and users may have different perspectives. These issues are discussed, along with possible future developments, such as the need for a standardized assessment of carer satisfaction. Copyright © 1998 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

From Home to ‘Home’: Situating Emotions within the Caregiving Experience

“…There is a significant body of work on informal caregiving in the sociological, gerontological, and social-policy literatures. Such studies have addressed a wide range of issues including the gendered nature of informal caring (see, for example, Aneshensel et al, 1995;Bywaters and Harris, 1998;Finch, 1987;Krause et al, 1999); the blurring of the boundaries between formal and informal caregiving in the home (for example, Dening and Lawton, 1998;Twigg, 2000); the health impacts of informal caring (for example, Aranda and Knight, 1997;Burns, 2000;Schneider et al, 1999); and the meaning of respite care (for example, Chapell et al, 2001). Of more immediate import to this paper is that work which addresses family and care-recipients' experiences of care-home settings (Chappell, 2001;Dupuis and Norris, 1997;Rowles and High, 1996;Ryan and Scullion, 2000).…”