Day-to-day home caring for a stroke survivor, two-year post-stroke perceived psychosocial impacts for woman caregivers in Luxembourg

In the Grand-Duchy of Luxembourg (GDL) informal caregivers are increasingly requested to provide daily home care to stroke survivors to avoid institutionalization (Kjellstrom et al. 20071). As this major life event brings upheavals to caregiver-survivor pairs, we aimed to identify and analyse the perceived psychosocial impacts for female caregivers. Method. Over 12 months, with the help of the Social Security, two-years post-stroke survivors were contacted, and 41 women (59,1 years) and 21 men (59,6 years) informal caregivers consented to participate in this cross national survey. Research assistants interviewed them at home, using face-to-face questionnaires, containing: 1) Life Satisfaction (LS) measure in accordance to the European Quality of Life Study (EQLS)2 (scale 0 - 10) ; 2) Caregiver Reaction Assessment 24 assertions (CRA) (Given et al., 19923); 3) 7 questions about the evolution of caregivers’ tasks and responsibilities in the household since the stroke onset. Means and percentages and, a comparison between sexes were estimated using t tests and chi². Results. The LS mean is lower in woman caregivers (6.84 vs. 8.00 male caregivers t = - 2.52). Women appear to be more affected in terms of physical health (33.0 ±22.1 vs. 19.1±20.1 t = 2.06), disrupted schedule (46.7 ±29.7 vs. 26.2 ±18.8 t = 2.54) and lack of family support (39.9 ±24.7 vs. 25.0 ±15.6 t = 2.18). More women responded to feel « tired all the time » (50.0% vs. 12.5% p=0.013) and found « difficult to find time for relaxation » (35.7% vs. 6.3% p=0.030). They admitted “others have dumped caring for their partner onto them” (35.7% vs. 11.8% p=0.078) and had difficulty “to get help from their family” (17.9% vs. 0.0% p = 0.073). Women considered to be more “in charge of the relationships with professionals” (52.0% vs. 6.3% p=0.003) and to “have more household responsibilities” than before the event (37.5% vs 5.9% p=0.020). Less women declared to « enjoy caring for their partner » (67.9% vs. 93.8% p= 0.049). Conclusions. Informal woman caregivers’ LS average (6.84) were one point lower than the indicator in 2007 for the GDL general population (7.85) who participated at the EQLS, near to the EU-27’ one (7.0). Our study showed their psychosocial repercussions them to require gender-based adaptation strategies to perform their caregiving role. Interventions reinforcing women’s health capability could improve their LS. Follow-up qualitative research would help to identify and understand women’s specific needs regarding these capabilities to develop.