Caregiving experiences of family caregivers of elderly persons with dementia in northern Taiwan.

This is part of the follow-up to of a large epidemiological study on the prevalence of dementia. Twenty-nine caregivers of demented elderly persons identified from previous study were further studied in the second phase in order to understand the caregiving experiences. In home, one-time, face-to-face interviews were used to collect data. Qualitative data derived from open-ended questions were transcribed verbatim and the content analyzed by the researchers for major themes. Difficult tasks most frequently reported by caregivers were difficulties in helping with activities of daily living, managing incontinence, and handling patient's health problems. Patient's memory and behavioral problems most frequently causing difficulties in care were suspicion/accusation, forgetfulness, and wandering. Strategies which were most often used by caregivers to handle specific difficult tasks were environmental management and doing/fixing for the elderly subject; to handle patient's memory/behavioral problems were convincing them and going along with them. In overall caregiving strategies, care arrangement was most often used by caregivers. The findings of this study can sensitize the health providers to a wide variety of difficulties and problems caregivers of patients with dementia encounter. Health providers might be also more aware of the different strategies caregivers use in handling these difficulties and problems. Efforts can be put into helping families use more effective strategies when handling the behavioral problems and caregiving difficulties.