The Spectrum of Family Caregiving for Adults and Elders with Chronic Illness - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0199828032 ISBN 13: 9780199828036

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 2016

Synopsis

The vast majority of care provided to adults and elders with chronic illness is given in the home, most often by family members. The caregiver's role is daunting; caregiving is often referred to as a 'career,' requiring long hours and arduous tasks. Primary caregivers show higher rates of morbidity and mortality, and caregiving is a major source of stress and burden to caregiving families. Presently, very little support is available to caregivers from either State or Federal agencies. However, awareness of this worsening problem is growing among health professionals and policy makers.

The Spectrum of Family Caregiving for Adults and Elders with Chronic Illness is written for individuals in the helping professions who are in roles that interface with or serve family caregivers who are supporting an adult or elder with a chronic condition. The volume includes eight disease-specific chapters written by experts from various disciplines. Each discusses the caregiving role and includes a thorough review of the literature on the characteristics of caregivers and care-recipients, including related care needs, issues, and challenges unique to that chronic illness. Chapters also review the extant literature on caregiver interventions. An Evidence Table is included in each of these chapters so that the reader can easily judge the quality of evidence supporting the intervention studies. Finally, each chapter includes two case studies describing common problems encountered by caregivers, along with descriptions of interventions used to address these problems. The final chapter summarizes the state of the science on caregiving roles and caregiver interventions and discusses the most relevant challenges and barriers faced by today's caregivers and caregiver advocates. This book will be valuable to clinicians and those in the helping professions, as well as academics and researchers with an interest in the study of family caregiving and caregiver interventions, and to health administrators, public officials, and policy makers concerned with chronic illness care and management.

About this title

About the Author:

Louis D. Burgio, PhD, is founder and director of Burgio Geriatric Consulting. During a career spanning over three decades, Dr. Burgio has held several academic leadership positions. Most recently he was the Harold R. Johnson Endowed Chair of Gerontology in the School of Social Work, University of Michigan. His research has focused on the development of social-behavioral interventions to improve the quality of care and quality of life of dementia patients and their caregivers.

Joseph E. Gaugler, PhD, is a Professor in the School of Nursing and Center on Aging at The University of Minnesota. Dr. Gaugler's research examines the sources and effectiveness of long-term care for chronically disabled older adults. Dr. Gaugler's interests include Alzheimer's disease and long-term care, the longitudinal ramifications of family care for disabled adults, and the effectiveness of community-based and psychosocial services for chronically ill adults and their caregiving families.

Michelle M. Hilgeman, PhD, is a licensed Clinical Research Psychologist in the Research and Development Service at the Tuscaloosa VA Medical Center. Dr. Hilgeman is an Adjunct Professor in The University of Alabama's Department of Psychology and The University of Alabama at Birmingham's Department of Medicine. She is also a Faculty Affiliate of the Alabama Research Institute on Aging, and an Investigator at the Tuscaloosa Research Education and Advancement Corporation.

Review:

"This extraordinary book presents what is currently known about caregiving for diverse conditions, including Alzheimer's, stroke, cancer, end-of-life, serious mental illness, and heart failure. The chapters carefully describe what makes the caregiving role unique for each condition, review the current status of disease-specific caregiver interventions, and provide illuminating case studies. This unique book will be essential reading for students, researchers, and clinicians who study caregiving or work with caregiving families." William E. Haley, PhD, Professor, School of Aging Studies, College of Behavioral and Community Sciences, University of South Florida

"This comprehensive and timely volume on family caregiving in chronic illness is an important contribution to the literature that will be valuable to scholars and students alike. Its focus on caregiving both within and across chronic illnesses will help address the still-extant problem of knowledge silos in the caregiving field." David E. Biegel, PhD, Henry L. Zucker Professor of Social Work Practice and Professor of Psychiatry and Sociology, Case Western Reserve University

"We see this book as a valuable resource for upper-level undergraduate and graduate coursework related to aging and health, as well as within social gerontology. The summary tables in each readable-length chapter point to original studies that can serve as primary-source reading assignments. The opening and closing chapters offer an overview and commentary that could be useful for classroom discussion.EL this book has much to offer clinicians in both medical and behavioral health settings. Those clinicians who specialize and have expertise in one chronic disease condition (e.g., 'I work with cancer patients and families coping with cancer') will appreciate the detailed and current reviews and tables summarizing the evidence for specific intervention approaches for that disease.EL Even if you thought that you knew the caregiving literature, with this book you will find yourself discovering new aspects of caregiving and new ways to move forward in your own work."The Gerontologist

About this edition

• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Publication date: 2016
• ISBN 10: 0199828032
• ISBN 13: 9780199828036
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 328
• Editor: Burgio Louis D.