Reflecting the increasing challenges facing families and our health system due to our reliance on family caregivers tending to long-term care needs of older adults, the Institute of Medicine has recently announced a new project on family caregivers. Topics they will investigate include unmet needs family caregivers may have, differences in their needs associated with sociodemographic factors, the projected gap between availability of family caregivers and the “need” for their support, and potential policies and system design modifications that could be made to better support family caregivers moving forward. They aim to release a report in early 2016, and will also hold several public events leading up to that report release.

AARP’s Public Policy Institute also recently released a fact sheet “Family Caregivers: The New Realities of Work and Family“.

Two groups have great resources available to help families and caregivers understand the hospital discharge planning process and transitional care:

• The Family Caregiver Alliance’s Hospital Discharge Planning: A Guide for Families and Caregivers covers topics such as what is discharge planning, why it is important, what the caregivers role is, paying for after-hospital care, and suggested questions for caregivers to ask providers.
• United Hospital Fund’s Next Step in Care initiative has released two briefs on family caregivers and providers working together to coordinate care. One resource, “A Family Caregiver’s Guide to Care Coordination” is aimed toward family caregivers, answering questions such as what is care coordination and explaining the roles of various hospital staff and providers.  They have also released a similar resource geared toward providers, “A Professional Care Coordinator’s Guide to Partnering with Family Caregivers“. These are available in several languages.

The Bridge Model has long recognized how being a family caregiver can impact one’s own life, so Bridge Care Coordinators intentionally talk with caregivers to assess for caregiver burden and support the caregivers by connecting with things such as caregiver support groups or respite care. However, we believe that it is critical for broader policy changes to occur to reduce the systemic reliance on family caregivers in order to meet the needs of older adults.