Contradicting long-standing conventional wisdom, results of a Johns Hopkins-led analysis of data previously gathered on more than 3,000 family caregivers suggests that those who assist a chronically ill or disabled family member enjoy an 18 percent survival advantage compared to statistically matched non-caregivers.
In a report, published in the current online version of the American Journal of Epidemiology, researchers found that providing care for a chronically ill or disabled family member not only fails to increase health risk, but also is associated with a nine-month extension in life expectancy over the six-year period of the study.
According to the Commission on Long-Term Care, family caregivers — the backbone of America's long-term care system — provide an estimated $450 billion in care and immeasurable support every year. An aging America means more demand for caregivers who help care for the elderly, but a looming shortage of caregivers could endanger many of the most vulnerable.
"Taking care of a chronically ill person in your family is often associated with stress, and caregiving has been previously linked to increased mortality rates," says first author, David L. Roth, Ph.D., director of the Johns Hopkins University Center on Aging and Health. "Our study provides important new information on the issue of whether informal family caregiving responsibilities are associated with higher or lower mortality rates as suggested by multiple conflicting previous studies."