The WHO Centre for Health Development (WHO Kobe Centre – WKC) has completed the tenth in its series of research briefs on Financing Long-term care: Lessons for Low- and Middle-Income Countries (LMICs) with a research brief on supporting informal caregivers in long-term care (LTC).
A key characteristic that differentiates LTC from health care is the existence of many informal caregivers to support older people in activities of daily living (such as bathing, dressing and toileting). Many informal caregivers are family and friends.
While relying on informal caregivers may be seen as an easy or inexpensive alternative to public LTC services, this has a very high cost to the economy. The value of the time and effort from informal caregiving is estimated at between 0.8% to 4.9% of GDP annually, including loss from reduced paid work hours and productivity from informal caregivers of working age.
The main way to support informal caregivers is through greater investments in formal LTC systems, that enabled working-age adults to combine informal caregiving with paid work. LTC services, such as home care, adult day care centres, personal caregiving support during the day and meal provision, may help informal caregivers to continue working in their paid jobs.
Countries have also implemented labour policies, such as paid and unpaid leave and flexible work arrangements, to enable people to provide informal care while remaining formally employed. Cash benefits provided to caregivers or care recipients aim to compensate informal caregivers; however, concerns exist that they may pressure women to remain in traditional, informal caregiving roles.
While training for informal caregivers has been widely undertaken to help them better manage the mental health pressures of caregiving; the evidence is weak that training reduces the negative effects of intensive caregiving in isolation of other policies.
This series was written by WKC’s Director, Dr Sarah Barber, who gratefully acknowledges the input of many colleagues and partners within and outside of WHO. WKC conducts research about innovations in service delivery models and sustainable financing to accelerate progress towards coverage and financial protection in the context of population ageing.
Find the brief here, and read more about all 10 briefs in the LTC financing project here.