,,A Study of Caregiving Systems in One Community: When and Why Elders Enter a Nursing Home

A Study of Caregiving Systems in One Community: When and Why Elders Enter a Nursing Home


 

Publication Date: January 1991

Publisher: Jewish Communal Service Association of North America

Author(s): Roberta Rubin Green; Hedy Dalin; Grace Lebow

Research Area: Health; Social conditions

Type: Report

Coverage: United States

Abstract:

An older person is more likely to enter a nursing home when he or she is very old, lacks financial and/or social supports, suffers from multiple physical disabilities, and is disoriented and incontinent. Families surveyed in this study made great efforts to care for their impaired elderly relatives in the community, seeing placement in a nursing home as a last resort. It is suggested that excessive caregiving burdens on family members are more likely to lead to nursing home placement than the actual health problems of the older relative.