Social, health and care issues

This paper attempts to analyse the selected factors that determine the form of care and points out the role of personal motivations to providing care for a dependent family member. Last but not least, the role of family cohesion, represented here as the nature of the relationship between the care-provider and the dependent family member is analysed.

Main goals of the presentation are: a) to introduce the needs of caregivers who provide care about elderly family member, b) to put such needs into the context of family environment and c) to relate the needs with the key risk factors. Methodology of a needs assessment, i.e., identification of the gap between current and optimal conditions for provided care was used.

Providing informal care to senior member of the family is in many cases challenging the overall family atmosphere, the bonds among family members, and the intergenerational relationships. Besides its positive effects on seniors who can stay within their natural physical and social environment, informal caregiving might impose an increased stress on informal caregivers, reduce their social life and decrease the quality of life. The paper informs about the quality of life as it was perceived by the informal caregivers - standardized instrument CQoL was used in this respect.