Chiara De Poli, Raphael Wittenberg, Amritpal Rehill, Madeleine Stevens, Nicola Brimblecombe
Unpaid, family carers play an important role in helping and supporting older parents and other relatives who may need help with some day-to-day activities. We know why family carers provide support to an older parent or relative and when they are willing to do so, but we do not know what expectations people who are not carers have about being a carer to an older parent or relative if and when they need care in the future. The aim of our study is to understand the expectations that middle-aged people have about providing care to an older parent in the future.
We organised six group discussions among people between 40 and 65 years of age living in England. We involved 35 people in total. When we spoke with them, some told us that they were carers because they were already providing support to an older parent. Others did not have a caring role and had never had a caring role (we called them non carers). In the discussion we asked the carers to tell us with what activities they were helping their parents and what expectations they had when they started to do so. We also asked them about what they would expect to happen next, if they could see their role changing in the future and why. We asked non carers to think about what being a carer for an older parent would be like.
Participants told us that they expected to help their parents in old age because that is what being a family means and it is a way of giving back what their parents gave them when they were children. Some suggested that this is also what their culture or religion expected from them. This can help explain why some considered themselves a carer but others who did help their parent did not say they were carers.
Carers told us that they started supporting their parents with any activities they needed help with, without much planning. When looking back they realised that being a carer had taken more time than they had expected. They were helping their parents and, at the same time, juggling other commitments, such as work and looking after their own family, and they found this stressful.
Both carers and non carers felt that the future was uncertain. They expected their parents to need more help, but they did not know when this would happen and what sort of help they would then need. If this happened, carers would have to find out what options for care would be available to them.
In general, people would find it useful to be more aware of what being a carer for an older parent may involve. It should also be easier for people to find information which is relevant for them at the time when they need it. People who provide care should also be helped to recognise that they are a carer, so that they can access help and support that they may find useful.
