Preserving caregiver health: CDC surveillance and health promotion initiatives for aging caregivers and care recipients

Initiatives of the Caregiving Program of the CDC Disability & Health Team are founded on the assumption that the better the health of caregivers, the longer and more successfully they can remain in caregiving roles. As a consequence, the health and quality of life of care recipients can be improved. Therefore, one pathway of improved health and quality of life for care recipients is through support for family caregivers. Based on these connections, the Caregiving Program, working in collaboration with CDC's Healthy Aging Program, adopted a lifespan approach to build a broad national agenda that emphasizes caregiving as a public health issue. The program focuses on caring for persons with functional disabilities, including those who are aging with a disability, and their caregivers. Recent advances in the program include development of the optional BRFSS caregiver module, creation of a searchable web-based database on caregiver research and, with guidance from a national expert panel, expansion of program goals. Data collection via the optional BRFSS module allows national state-level, population-based data on caregiving to be tabulated and used by states to develop caregiver support plans. A searchable web-based database on caregiver research provides specific attention to both government and non-governmental instruments that contain caregiver-related variables or that can inform caregiver health and behavior if used in combination. A 2007 expert panel contributed to the foundation of a national caregiving agenda. This presentation focuses on caregiving as a public health issue and ways to address emerging care challenges presented by an aging population.