A Study on Caring Perception of Informal Caregivers of Elders

Abstract

The advancement in public health and medical technologies, during the twenty first century leads to increase the life expectancy, it leads to over population especially aging. Increasing number of elders has been increasing in the number of elders with disability; hence the elders require the palliative care assistance to fulfill their daily activities with the help of formal or informal caregivers. The informal caregivers of elders refers to non-paid individuals, who are primarily responsible for providing and/or coordinating care of the elders in their house, such as a spouse, offspring, other relative and non-relative, they act as anticipatory, preventive, supervisory, instrumental and protective roles. The rapid changes of familial system, the caregivers of elder were faced psycho-social, physical and financial problems. The researcher was motivated to undertake the level of caregiver caring perception of BPL (Below Poverty Line) informal care givers of elder at Coimbatore city with the objectives of to assess the personal background of the selected respondents and to find out the different levels of caregiver caring perception. The researcher adopted descriptive research design, census method of sampling and interview schedule is the tool for data collection in his study. The strong filial-piety norms, traditional values and community respect were influenced the positive thoughts as well as the financial problems, tedious caring job, difficulty in fulfilling the elders’ basic needs were negative thoughts of caring the informal caregivers of elders.

Keywords: Informal caregiver, BPL (Below Poverty Line), Perception, Strong filial-piety norms, Community respect