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Aims and objectives.  This study examines the physical and emotional burden experienced by caregivers of stroke survivors, compared with caregivers of patients having neurological diseases.

Background.  Stroke survivors have residual neurological impairment, which requires long-term support and care. Anxiety, depression and poor physical health are common sequelae among family caregivers of stroke survivors. There is a reasonably consistent association between patients’ levels of disability and emotional state and the emotional distress of their caregivers.

This article describes the development of a new service for people with dementia and their carers in a large post-industrial city in the north of England, UK. The service arose in response to the perceived inadequacies of existing respite care provision and has proved very successful in meeting the needs of people with dementia and their family carers, and in providing high levels of job satisfaction for staff. The success of the initiative can be understood using the Senses Framework and relationship-centred care as an analytic lens to identify key attributes of the service.

The present study describes and compares quality of life (QoL) and factors which predict QoL among people aged 75 years and over who receive help with activities of daily living (ADLs) from formal and/or informal helpers. The subjects were living at home or in special accommodation in Sweden. A postal questionnaire was sent to a randomly selected and age-stratified sample of 8500 people. The response rate was 52.8% (n = 4337), and 1247 people [mean age (± SD) = 86.4 ± 5.9 years] received help and indicated who helped them with ADLs.

The aim of this study was to assess the impact of incontinence management on informal caregivers of older persons with incontinence. In order to investigate this phenomenon in different welfare systems via qualitative interviews and a content analysis methodology, the study was carried out in four European countries (Italy, the Netherlands, Slovak Republic and Sweden). To this purpose, 50 semi-structured interviews were conducted with spouses and children of older people receiving their help to manage the consequences of involuntary urinary and/or faecal leakage.

Purpose. Stroke is a health crisis that can prompt a re-organisation of lives and impact on family caregivers. This study extends existing findings by investigating the experiences of partners of young stroke survivors (under 60 years old) two to seven years post-stroke. Method. Semi-structured interviews with seven partners were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis. Results. Two super-ordinate themes emerged, 'Adjustment' and 'Coping'.

Background: Although research has shown that significant burden and adverse psychological impact are associated with caring for a child with brain injury, limited knowledge exists concerning the qualitative experience and impact of this burden.

Objective: To provide an account of the experiences of mothers who care for a childhood survivor of brain injury.

Research design: Postal survey.

Housing support policy for persons with disabilities who require access to 24-hour formal or informal support is changing throughout Australia. This is consistent with international trends including: independent living in generic housing; facilitating choices about where and with whom people live; individualised home-based support; and community integration. Are these trends leading to policies that are effective in the Australian context ? This article presents a framework for analysing the effectiveness of new approaches to housing support using a rights perspective.

Young carers are children and young people who look after family members with illness, disabilities, mental illness or substance misuse. Many of these young carers help with personal nursing care and administration of medication as well as household tasks and care of younger siblings. Inappropriate levels of caring can impact on a child's own emotional and physical health, educational achievement and life chances.

The presence of an informal carer is often a prerequisite for successful palliative home care, and the staff's ability to support informal carers' coping in such situations is important. Recent research has revealed that it is possible to achieve positive psychological states in palliative care despite the burdening situation.

This article considers the coping strategies of families with children and adults with intellectual disabilities. It is argued that the literature on coping and resilience in families has often been overlooked in favour of deficit models of family functioning. The study was designed to provide a further test of the transactional model of coping, but more especially, to explore which problem-solving, cognitive and stress reduction coping strategies family members found useful.