"Here we all are Caregivers": Issues of Collectivity versus Individuality in a Study of Home Care-giving of Patients with Advanced Dementia

Abstract

The study of home care of patients with advanced dementia illustrates how implicit contextual issues in the literature bias understanding about family care. Many of the studies are conducted in developed countries with an older population, high unemployment, nuclear family structure and with social and health care systems that support caregiving at home. The body of knowledge concerning family care is shaped by individual experiences of primary caregivers that have systems of formal support to care for their relatives, these systems are practically nonexistent in developing countries. This paper presents the concept of "caregiving within the family" that sheds light on the collective dimension of family care and caregivers' resourcefulness. The concept of family care is thus developed enabling interventions that fit with caregivers' realities and everyday life. URN: urn:nbn:de:0114-fqs060458