Factors influencing caregiver burden among those caring for older people over 65 years in long-term care: insights from Taiwan's long-term care services system

Home care, which supports the concept of aging in place, has been shown to negatively impact caregivers’ health and quality of life. This study examined how care recipients’ self-care abilities and caregivers' support environment affect caregiver burden, using data from the Multi-Aspects Assessment Instrument of Taiwan's long-term care system. A total of 653 records met the study's inclusion criteria. The caregivers’ had a mean age of 59.17 years, 73.15 % lived with the care recipient, and the average caregiver burden score was 7.16. After controlling the care recipients’ gender, age, education level, and marital status, the results revealed that better IADL abilities in care recipients were associated with less burden on the caregiver (unstandardized coefficient b=-0.04, p<.01). Additionally, caregivers were less burdened when care recipients could remain at home alone for one to three hours (unstandardized coefficient b=-0.32, p<.01). However, caregiver burden increased if they had more than one person to take care of (unstandardized coefficient b = 0.78, p<.001), and their health status deteriorated (unstandardized coefficient b=-0.37, p<.001). Targeted interventions to improve recipients’ independence could alleviate caregiver stress.