HEALTH PLUS MED­ICAL COR­RE­SPON­DENT

Care­giv­ing is a tough job. This No­vem­ber, with­in which nu­mer­ous Health Days are com­mem­o­rat­ed, we re­mem­ber the in­di­vid­u­als who lov­ing­ly give baths and med­ica­tions, clean hous­es, shop for, and com­fort the mil­lions of el­der­ly and ail­ing pa­tients who are clients, friends or loved ones. We al­so recog­nise that the every­day de­mands of care­giv­ing are al­ready a full-time job, made even more chal­leng­ing with the ad­di­tion­al de­ci­sion-mak­ing and pro­tec­tive mea­sures to safe­guard your loved ones from COVID-19.

No­vem­ber is Na­tion­al Fam­i­ly Care­givers Month and this year’s theme is “Care­giv­ing Around the Clock.”

Na­tion­al Fam­i­ly Care­givers Month high­lights es­sen­tial in­for­ma­tion to help care­givers cope with a tough, and some­times thank­less job. Fo­cus is placed on the chal­lenges care­givers ex­pe­ri­ence, learn­ing the skills to speak ef­fec­tive­ly with doc­tors, and be­ing open to new, as­sis­tive tech­nolo­gies that can light­en your load and most im­por­tant­ly pre­vent Care­giv­er Burnout. If you don’t take care of your­self, who will?

Care­givers of­ten ig­nore their own health

Watch­ing a par­ent age or see­ing some­one change dras­ti­cal­ly due to ill­ness can be dev­as­tat­ing. Har­vard Health re­ports, “Ap­prox­i­mate­ly 70 per­cent of care­givers in­di­cat­ed they don’t see their doc­tor reg­u­lar­ly be­cause of their re­spon­si­bil­i­ties.” Main­tain­ing your own well­be­ing is cru­cial, but of­ten dif­fi­cult. If you are not sleep­ing well, ex­er­cis­ing, or feel your­self be­com­ing reclu­sive, speak to a health care pro­fes­sion­al about de­pres­sion. It can hit any­one, at any time.

What is Care­giv­er Stress Syn­drome?

Care­giv­er stress syn­drome is a con­di­tion char­ac­terised by phys­i­cal, men­tal and emo­tion­al ex­haus­tion. It typ­i­cal­ly re­sults from a per­son ne­glect­ing his/her own phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al health be­cause he/she is fo­cused on car­ing for an ill, in­jured or dis­abled loved one. Care­giv­ing may in­volve meet­ing com­plex de­mands with­out any train­ing or help.

There are sev­er­al fac­tors that can play a role in care­giv­er stress syn­drome. For some care­givers, the stress­es of car­ing for a per­son who has a de­bil­i­tat­ing ill­ness and feel­ing help­less while care­giv­ing, re­sults in burnout. For oth­ers, the lack of bound­aries be­tween their roles as a care­giv­er and a spouse, child, or oth­er loved one can be chal­leng­ing. Care­givers put un­re­al­is­tic ex­pec­ta­tions on them­selves, think­ing that they can do it all and re­fus­ing to ask for help. The fi­nan­cial re­sources need­ed to care for some­one with a long-term ill­ness or dis­abil­i­ty al­so con­tributes to the over­whelm.

The mag­ni­tude of the prob­lem

Care­giv­er stress syn­drome is strong­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with neg­a­tive health out­comes. Be­tween 40 to 70% of care­givers suf­fer from de­pres­sion, while many care­givers al­so have anx­i­ety be­cause of the stress as­so­ci­at­ed with pro­vid­ing care. Anger and ir­ri­tabil­i­ty are al­so com­mon symp­toms of care­giv­er stress syn­drome. The chron­ic stress may al­so lead to high blood pres­sure, di­a­betes, and a com­pro­mised im­mune sys­tem.

Ac­cord­ing to stud­ies by Har­vard Health:

- 45% of care­givers re­port­ed chron­ic con­di­tions, in­clud­ing heart at­tacks, heart dis­ease, can­cer, di­a­betes, and arthri­tis;

- Women who spend nine or more hours a week car­ing for a spouse in­creased their risk of heart dis­ease by 100%;

- Care­givers have a 23% high­er lev­el of stress hor­mones and 15% low­er lev­el of an­ti­body re­spons­es than non-care­givers,

- 72% of care­givers re­port that they had not gone to the doc­tor as of­ten as they should have;

- 58% of care­givers state that their eat­ing habits are worse than be­fore they as­sumed this role;

- Care­givers be­tween the ages of 66 and 96 have a 63% high­er mor­tal­i­ty rate than non-care­givers of the same age.

What to look out for?

The signs in­clude:

- Feel­ing over­whelmed or help­less

- Feel­ing alone, iso­lat­ed, or de­sert­ed by oth­ers

- Sleep­ing too much or too lit­tle

- Gain­ing or los­ing a lot of weight, change in ap­petite

- Los­ing in­ter­est in ac­tiv­i­ties you used to en­joy

- Be­com­ing eas­i­ly ir­ri­tat­ed or an­gered

- Feel­ing tired most of the time

- Hav­ing headaches or body aches of­ten

- Get­ting sick more of­ten

- Turn­ing to un­healthy be­hav­iours like smok­ing or drink­ing al­co­hol

What can I do to pre­vent or re­lieve care­giv­er stress?

Once you have recog­nised the signs of care­giv­er stress syn­drome, the next step is to man­age it. One of the first things that you can and should do is to take a break. Hav­ing this con­di­tion isn’t un­usu­al, the key is to make your own health a pri­or­i­ty so that you can con­tin­ue to pro­vide care for your loved one.

Re­mem­ber that if you feel bet­ter, you can take bet­ter care of your loved one.

Tak­ing steps to pre­vent or re­lieve care­giv­er stress WILL help pre­vent health prob­lems.

It will al­so be eas­i­er to fo­cus on the re­wards of care­giv­ing. Some ways to help your­self in­clude:

- Stay­ing in touch with fam­i­ly and friends. It's im­por­tant for you to have emo­tion­al sup­port.

- Ask­ing for and ac­cept­ing help. Make a list of ways oth­ers can help you. Let helpers choose what they would like to do. For in­stance, some­one might sit with the per­son you care for, while you do an er­rand. Some­one else might pick up gro­ceries for you.

- Learn­ing bet­ter ways to help your loved one. For ex­am­ple, hos­pi­tals of­fer class­es that can teach you how to care for some­one with an in­jury or ill­ness.

- Find­ing care­giv­ing re­sources in your com­mu­ni­ty to help you. Many com­mu­ni­ties have adult day­care ser­vices or respite ser­vices. Us­ing one of these can give you a break from your care­giv­ing du­ties.

- Tak­ing care of your own health. Try to find time to be phys­i­cal­ly ac­tive on most days of the week, choose healthy foods, and get enough sleep. Make sure that you keep up with your med­ical care such as reg­u­lar check­ups and screen­ings.

- Con­sid­er­ing tak­ing a break from your job if you al­so work and are feel­ing over­whelmed. Check with your hu­man re­sources of­fice about your op­tions.

- En­gag­ing tech­nol­o­gy. There are apps to as­sist in man­ag­ing the phar­ma­ceu­ti­cal needs of your loved ones and en­sure med­ica­tions are de­liv­ered in a time­ly man­ner.

Care­giv­er stress syn­drome does not have to be your re­al­i­ty. While it can have a neg­a­tive im­pact on your life and well-be­ing, there are ways to re­cov­er and to be a hap­pi­er, health­i­er care­giv­er for your loved one. By tak­ing time for your­self and fo­cus­ing on your own needs, you can avoid the per­ils of care­giv­er stress syn­drome.

Look out for HEALTH PLUS every Tues­day for more in­for­ma­tive and health­ful ar­ti­cles. If you have any ques­tions or con­cerns re­gard­ing this top­ic, please email Guardian­Health­Plus2020@gmail.com