"Caregiving Needs Double As End Of Life Nears" - Maureen Salamon

Reliance on caregivers doubles as people near death, and half of those caregivers -- typically unpaid family members -- report having no time for themselves, a new study indicates. "We were certainly aware when dealing with end-of-life care that families are mostly involved, but we couldn't quantify that prior to this research," said study author Katherine Ornstein, PhD, assistant professor of geriatrics and palliative medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. Dr. Ornstein and her team found that dying adults had an average of 2.5 caregivers assisting them. Those near the end of life received 61 hours of help per week compared to 35 hours of help per week for older adults who weren’t at the end of life. Dr. Ornstein hopes greater awareness of the family burden of caregiving, especially on end of life, comes from her research. "We need to think about expanding access to palliative care services, which can help facilitate the delivery of supportive services to families earlier," she added. "And we can see how we need to provide more paid family leave so families can provide the support we're pretty much expecting them to provide."

- Katherine Ornstein, PhD, Assistant Professor, Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai

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The Philadelphia Inquirer