Family Caregiver's Burden of Stroke Patients

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The role of family caregivers is becoming more important for the recovery of patients with stroke, as the prevalence of stroke is increasing. Consequently, the burden of caregiving can affect both patients' and caregiver's functional health. The purpose of this study was to make a novel caregiving burden scale and evaluate factors that influence the burden of the family caregiver. METHODS: The caregiver burden scale consists of four aspects psycho-emotional, financial, physical and isolation from social activities. The questionnaire was administrated to the family care-givers of 118 patients with stroke who consented to be interviewed. Among 118 caregivers, we analyzed 106 caregivers who answered the questionnaire completely. We evaluated the construct validity and internal reliability of the burden scale and applied multiple regression analysis for the factors that influence caregiver's burden. RESULTS:1) Construct validity by factor analysis and Internal reliability was high 2) Among 106 caregivers, 40 (37.7%) approached subjective depression on the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). There was a statistically significant difference(p<0.01) in the strength of burden between the groups with and without depression. 3)Of the variables, including patient's age, caregiver's age, duration of caregiving, education level of caregiver, and socio-economic status of family, only the BDI scores of caregivers and the Barthel Index scores of patients were correlated to the degree of caregiving burden. CONCLUSIONS: This caregiving burden scale can be a useful tool for the evaluation of caregiver's burden with stroke. We believe that thoughtful consideration and realistic support for family caregivers can be very important in the long-term management of patients with stroke. (J Korean Neurol Assoc 19(3)213~218, 2001)