Regular Research ArticleA Comparison of Psychosocial Outcomes in Elderly Alzheimer Caregivers and Noncaregivers
Section snippets
Participants
Participants were 125 CGs of spouses with AD and 60 participants married to nondemented spouses (i.e., NCs) enrolled in the Alzheimer's Caregiver Project at the University of California, San Diego. The primary purpose of this study was to longitudinally evaluate psychological and physical health in CGs of dementia patients and demographically similar NCs. Because a greater proportion of CGs were anticipated to place their spouses into long-term care and/or lose their spouses to death, two CGs
Participants
Demographic characteristics of CG and NC are presented in Table 1. As seen in the table, CG and NC were demographically similar in all respects except race/ethnicity, in which a greater proportion of NC was minority. As expected, significant group differences existed for CDR scores (t = 17.46, df = 182, p <0.001).
Psychosocial Outcomes
Group comparisons on psychosocial outcome domains are presented in Table 1. As seen, CGs and NCs differed on a number of outcomes. Specifically, CGs endorsed greater levels of global
Conclusions
This study compares a breadth of psychosocial outcomes in demographically similar CGs and NCs and highlights not only the many struggles that AD CGs face, but also the many areas that care providers may intervene to improve CG's overall well-being. Indeed, few studies highlight CG/NC differences on the number of outcomes assessed in this study (∼30 outcomes). Although some of our outcomes overlap those presented in prior studies (e.g., depressive and anxiety symptoms), this study provides new
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