PSYCHIATRIC AND PHYSICAL MORBIDITY EFFECTS OF DEMENTIA CAREGIVING - PREVALENCE, CORRELATES, AND CAUSES

The dementia caregiving literature is reviewed with the goals of (a) a ssessing the prevalence and magnitude of psychiatric and physical morb idity effects among caregivers, (b) identifying individual and context ual correlates of reported health effects and their underlying causes, and (c) examining the policy relevance of observed findings. Virtuall y all studies report elevated levels of depressive symptomatology amon g caregivers, and those using diagnostic interviews report high rates of clinical depression and anxiety. The evidence is more equivocal and generally weaker for the association between caregiving and physical morbidity, such as self-rated health, number of illnesses, symptomatol ogy, health care utilization, preventive health behaviors, and cardiov ascular functioning. Across studies, psychiatric morbidity in caregive rs was linked to patient problem behaviors, income, self-rated health, perceived stress, and life satisfaction. Physical morbidity was assoc iated with patient problem behaviors and cognitive impairment, and wit h caregiver depression, anxiety, and perceived social support. Possibl e causes of reported effects and policy implications are discussed.