The Lived Experience of Informal Caregivers of People Who Have Severe Mental Illness and Coexisting Long-Term Conditions: A Qualitative Study.

Publisher: Wiley Country of Publication: England NLM ID: 9815926 Publication Model: Print Cited Medium: Internet ISSN: 1369-7625 (Electronic) Linking ISSN: 13696513 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Health Expect Subsets: MEDLINE

Original Publication: Oxford, UK : Wiley, c1998-

Caregivers*/psychology ; Qualitative Research* ; Mental Disorders*; Humans ; Female ; Male ; Middle Aged ; Chronic Disease ; Adult ; Focus Groups ; England ; Interviews as Topic ; Aged

Background: People with severe mental illness (SMI) experience higher rates and poorer outcomes of physical long-term conditions (LTCs). The management of SMI and LTCs is highly complex and many people with SMI rely on informal carers for support, which may lead to high levels of caregiver burden, and caregiver burnout. Caregiver burnout can result in poor health outcomes for informal carers and a reduction in the quality of care they are able to provide. Therefore, it is important to understand the caring experience to identify and address factors that contribute to burden and burnout.
Methods: This paper reports a secondary qualitative analysis of semistructured interviews and focus groups conducted with informal carers of people who have coexisting SMI and LTCs. We recruited 12 informal carers in England between December 2018 and April 2019. The transcripts were coded and analysed thematically.
Results: We identified two overarching themes and five subthemes. The themes included 'Fighting on all fronts: Mounting strain between demands and resources', which described the challenge of providing care in the context of coexisting SMI and LTCs, and 'Safekeeping: The necessity of chronic hypervigilance', which captured how informal carers' roles were defined by managing high-risk situations, leading to hypervigilance and paternalistic approaches to care.
Conclusion: The experience of informal carers for people with SMI and coexisting LTCs is marked by limited access to support and the management of significant risk, which could contribute to high caregiver burden. Further primary research is needed to understand how the experiences of the caregiver role for people with SMI and LTCs influence caregiver burden.
Patient or Public Contribution: Our PPI panel DIAMONDS Voice provided guidance on this study from conception, design and development of interview guides and recruitment materials to final write-up. DIAMONDS Voice consists of service users and carers who have experience of SMI and LTCs. Three carer members reviewed the final manuscript, and two are credited as authors.
(© 2024 The Author(s). Health Expectations published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.)

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This paper reports work undertaken as part of the DIAMONDS programme, which is funded by the National Institute for Health Research under its Programme Grants for Applied Research (project number RP-PG-1016-20003).

Keywords: caregiver burden; informal caregivers; long‐term conditions; qualitative; severe mental illness

Date Created: 20240616 Date Completed: 20240616 Latest Revision: 20240916

20240916

PMC11180294

10.1111/hex.14119

38879785