Caregiver Burden In The United States Workforce: Health Care Resource Utilization And Quality of Life

To understand caregiver burden in the workplace as well as caregiver healthcare resource utilization and quality of life. We included employed adults aged 18 years or older from the 2013 US National Health and Wellness Survey (NHWS) in this study. Employed adults were classified as a caregiver if they reported currently caring for at least one adult relative. We used chi-square tests and one-way analyses of variance to assess whether employed caregivers differed from employed non-caregivers on behavioral characteristics, workplace productivity, and healthcare resource utilization. Eight million workers (7%) are caregivers for one or more adults in the US. Nearly 18% of these caregivers are caring for two or more adults. Caregivers are more often female than male (51% vs. 49%, p<0.05) and 53% are between 40 and 64 years of age. Eighteen percent of caregivers are Hispanic compared with 15% of non-caregivers (p<0.05). Behavioral characteristics, specifically daily alcohol consumption (6% vs. 5%) and lack of vigorous exercise, (25% vs. 29%) were similar in caregivers as compared to non-caregivers. Whereas compared with non-caregivers, caregivers have a higher prevalence of smoking (26% vs. 19%, p<0.05). Caregivers report a higher mean percentage of work time missed (8% vs. 4%, p<0.05) as well as greater productivity impairment (24% vs. 14%, p<0.05). 53% of caregivers report some form of depression compared to 32% of non-caregivers that report some form of depression (p<0.05). Caregivers have higher self-reported insomnia as compared to non-caregivers (46% vs. 37%, p<0.05). Caregivers report more diagnosed co-morbidities compared with non-caregivers (5 vs. 3, p<0.05). In the previous 6 months, caregivers have a greater mean number of outpatient visits compared with non-caregivers (4 vs. 3, p<0.05). Caregivers are an important component of patient care that clinicians and employers should be cognizant of and help to mitigate caregiver burden.