The study, "Family Caregiving in Parkinson's Disease (PD): A Ten-Year Follow-Up," was presented recently at the annual meetings of the Parkinson Study Group and the American Academy of Neurology.
The study is an eight-year follow-up to an assessment of more than 300 Parkinson's disease caregivers between 1992 and 1994 in what was called "The Parkinson's Spouse's Project." Using the project's data, the recent study aimed to predict changes in caregiver strain, depression and physical health from 1992 to 2002, and describe changes in caregiving and their connections to strain, depression, physical health, the quality of the relationship, and optimism and pessimism.
The recent study surveyed 156 of the original project participants: 105, or 67 percent, continued to care for spouses with Parkinson's disease at home; 11, or 7 percent, had spouses in a care facility, such as a nursing home; and 40, or 26 percent, were bereaved.
The study found that the health, strain, optimism and pessimism, and quality of the relationship - mutuality - deteriorated "significantly" over 10 years among the 105 caregivers with spouses at home.
"How depressed you are in 1992 explains a lot about what happens to your mental health long term, as does optimism and pessimism," Carter said. "If we identify caregivers early who have depression, we might be able to intervene early to treat their depression. Another option may be to teach people to be more optimistic."
Another notable finding is that mutuality is a risk factor for declining health.
"Mutuality is the quality of relationship itself between the patient and spouse - how much time they spend together, how much they enjoy each other, care for each other, how easy it is to be with each other," Carter explained. "We think high mutuality is protective against experiencing a lot of strain."
Carter said the lesson to be learned from the study i
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Contact: Jonathan Modie
modiej@ohsu.edu
503 494-8231
Oregon Health & Science University
26-May-2004