ABSTRACT
The aim of the present study is to characterize the burden of parents who care for their children with disabilities with the use of a Japanese version of the Zarit Caregiver Burden Interview (J-ZBI) that has been successfully used to quantify the caregiver burden for caring for the disabled elderly. We performed a survey in which questionnaires including the J-ZBI (adapted for the subjects of this study) were given to 135 parents of children in a school for the physically challenged. We obtained 69 valid responses. For the parents, the mean J-ZBI score was 25.6 points and the mean CES-D score was 10.8 points. A lowered QOL for these parents was suggested by the finding that the mean SF-36 score was lower than for other persons of the same year and age in Japan. The parents reported physical strain more frequently than mental stress as the main caregiver burden. According to the parent group's mean J-ZBI score, we classified them into either a heavier or a lighter burden group. The parents who were in a state of depression as judged by the CES-D were more frequently found in the heavier burden group, while those with children who showed complete or modified independence in more items of FIM were more frequent in the lighter burden group. Services to support the physical aspects of parents caring for children with disabilities would reduce their caregiver burden effectively.