TY  - JOUR
AU  - Ferreira, Pâmela Moraes
AU  - Gomes, Mateus Cunha
AU  - de Araujo, Lucianne Nascimento
AU  - Oliveira, Tainá Sayuri Onuma de
AU  - Ferreira, Glenda
AU  - Aben-Athar, Cintia
AU  - da Silva, Silvio Eder Dias
AU  - Cruz Ramos, Aline M P
AU  - Rodrigues, Diego Pereira
AU  - Sousa, Fabianne
PY  - 2023
DA  - 2023/11/23
TI  - Sociodemographic Profile, Health Conditions, and Burden of Informal Caregivers of Older Adults in Brazil During the COVID-19 Pandemic: Cross-Sectional, Exploratory, Noninterventional, Descriptive Study
JO  - JMIR Form Res
SP  - e47510
VL  - 7
KW  - informal caregivers
KW  - older adult
KW  - caregiver
KW  - caregivers
KW  - caregiving
KW  - burden
KW  - informal care
KW  - cross-sectional
KW  - gerontology
KW  - older adults
KW  - hospitalized
KW  - overload
KW  - burnout
AB  - Background: Demographic changes in the world population have resulted in an increasingly aging society, with a progressive increase in the number of people in situations of dependence, who require assistance from family members to meet their basic needs. Caring for older adults involves performing diverse activities, resulting in reduced free time and tiredness, and fulfilling the demands and expectations related to personal, family, physical, and social life, consequently compromising the quality of life of the caregiver. In this context, the informal caregiver of hospitalized older adults emerges as the focus of attention. Objective: The aim of this study was to describe the sociodemographic profile, health conditions, and burden of informal caregivers of older adults admitted to a university hospital in Brazil during the COVID-19 pandemic period. Methods: This is a cross-sectional, descriptive, and analytical study that was conducted with 25 informal caregivers of hospitalized older adults in a university hospital in Brazil between August and September 2022. Three instruments were applied: Caregiver Burden Inventory, sociodemographic questionnaire, and health conditions questionnaire. The data were analyzed using SPSS version 28.0. Descriptive (frequency and percentage) and inferential analyses were performed using 2-sided Student t test with 95% CIs. Results: Of the 25 interviewees, 18 (72%) were females, 17 (46%) were married or in a stable union, 14 (56%) completed secondary education, and 11 (44%) lived with the older adults who needed care. The average age of the participants was 44 (SD 12.8) years. Regarding their health conditions, most caregivers self-reported it as good (12/25, 48%). They provided care to their father or mother older than 70 years (14/25, 56%). The Caregiver Burden Inventory analysis showed that the caregivers were the most negatively impacted in the domains of personal life overload (mean 10.8, SD 3.46; P=.047) and physical overload (mean 10.6, SD 2.32; P=.02). Conclusions: In recent years, there has been an increase in the burden on informal caregivers of hospitalized older adults in Brazil, thereby impacting their personal and physical lives. The findings of our study show that health care professionals should be trained to promote health guidelines and actions to improve the personal and physical lives of the caregiver population in Brazil. 
SN  - 2561-326X
UR  - https://formative.jmir.org/2023/1/e47510
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2196/47510
UR  - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37995120
DO  - 10.2196/47510
ID  - info:doi/10.2196/47510
ER  -