- Title
- Impact of informal caregiving on older adults' physical and mental health in low-income and middle-income countries: a cross-sectional, secondary analysis based on the WHO's Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE)
- Creator
- Lambert, Sylvie D.; Bowe, Steven J.; Livingston, Patricia M.; Heckel, Leila; Cook, Selina; Kowal, Paul; Orellana, Liliana
- Relation
- BMJ Open Vol. 7, Issue 11, no. e017236
- Publisher Link
- http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmjopen-2017-017236
- Publisher
- BMJ Group
- Resource Type
- journal article
- Date
- 2017
- Description
- Objectives: A high proportion of care stemming from chronic disease or disability in low-income and middle-income countries is provided by informal caregivers. The goal of this study was to determine the level of burden experienced by these caregivers, explore associated factors and assess whether caregivers' and non-caregivers' health differed. Design and setting: This cross-sectional study was a secondary analysis of data on caregivers' burden, health and health risk factors in Ghana, India and the Russian Federation collected as part of the WHO's Study on global AGEing and adult health (SAGE) Wave 1. Participants: Caregivers in Ghana (n=143), India (n=490) and Russia (n=270) completed the measures. Outcome measures: Factors associated (ie, demographics and caregiving profile variables) with burden were explored among caregivers. Then, quality of life (QOL), perceived stress, depression, self-rated health (SRH) and health risk factors were compared between caregivers and matched non-caregivers (1:2).The largest caregiving subgroups were spouses and adult children. Caregivers mostly cared for one person and provided financial, social/emotional and/or physical support, but received little support themselves. Burden level ranged from 17.37 to 20.03. Variables associated with burden were mostly country-specific; however, some commonality for wealth, type of care and caregiving duration was noted. Caregivers with a moderate or high level of burden reported lower QOL and higher perceived stress than those experiencing low burden. Caregivers reported lower QOL and SRH than non-caregivers. Results: Given the lack of support received and consequences of the burden endured by caregivers, policy and programme initiatives are needed to ensure that caregivers in low- and middle-income countries can fulfil their role without compromising their own health.
- Subject
- caregiving; older adults; chronic disease; physical health; mental health; disability; WHO; ageing
- Identifier
- http://hdl.handle.net/1959.13/1393844
- Identifier
- uon:33617
- Identifier
- ISSN:2044-6055
- Rights
- © Article author(s) (or their employer(s) unless otherwise stated in the text of the article) 2017. All rights reserved. No commercial use is permitted unless otherwise expressly granted. This is an Open Access article distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/.
- Language
- eng
- Full Text
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