AUTHOR=McGarrigle Christine A. , Ward Mark , Kenny Rose Anne 

TITLE=An investigation of what protective individual- and community-level factors are associated with life satisfaction in middle-aged and older family carers in Ireland

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Public Health

VOLUME=Volume 11 - 2023

YEAR=2023

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/public-health/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2023.1207523

DOI=10.3389/fpubh.2023.1207523

ISSN=2296-2565

ABSTRACT=Background: Family caring plays an essential role in providing care in society. However, caring can cause stress and mental and physical responses to caring vary widely. Different outcomes for carers may reflect different approaches or adaptability to caring and their ability to maintain or recover their mental health and well-being following an adverse event (psychosocial resilience). We aim to identify factors that may promote psychosocial resilience, conceptualized as maintaining or recovering subjective well-being and operationalized as satisfaction with life, of carers.
Methods: Data were from 6 Waves (2009-2021) of The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA), a prospective biennial nationally representative longitudinal study of older adults aged ≥50 in Ireland. Family caregiving was assessed in Waves 3-6. Participants were asked if they cared for someone, their relationship to the recipient, and the number of hours per week that they provided care. We used growth mixture modelling to identify latent trajectories of satisfaction with life (SWL) before and after caring initiated. Regression modelling was then used to identify protective factors (individual, family, and community level) associated with resilient trajectories.
Results: Overall, 731 (12.2%) of participants became carers during follow-up. We identified three trajectories in SWL in carers following initiation of caring: Resilient-Stable (81%), Resilient-Recovery (12%), and Nonrecovery (6%). Membership of Resilient-Stable and Resilient-Recovery trajectories was associated with fewer depressive symptoms (OR=0.86, 95% CI 0.78,0.94) and chronic conditions (OR=0.21, 95% CI 0.06,0.74), larger social networks (OR=2.03, 95% CI 1.06,3.86), more close friends and relatives (OR=1.15, 95% CI 1.01,1.32) and caring for someone other than a child (OR=0.19, 95% CI 0.07,0.51) compared to the Nonrecovery group.
Conclusion: Becoming a family carer was associated with a decline in SWL over time in some carers. However, most carers either did not experience a decline in SWL or recovered their SWL over time. We found that both individual and community-level supports may be protective for carers’ well-being. These results will inform the priorities for social and community-level services and support for older carers and contribute to the design of new projects and programs to meet these needs.