Helping a family primary caregiver adjust to caregiving stress

The authors present a case study of a nursing experience with a primary caregiver who cared for his wife for more than 10 years (1/18/92 to 1/29/02). Data were collected by observation, interviews, physical examination, and an assessment instrument consisting of the Barthrel Index, Karnofsky Scale, Caregiver Burden, Risk of Impaired Nutritional Status, Quality of Caregiving Index, Norton Skin Index, and Major nursing problems for both the care receiver and caregiver were: a) everyday quality of life was severely impacted by an overload of caregiving stress, b) insufficient social support, and c) deficiencies in family functioning. The authors describe the details of the primary intervention effort, primarily helping the patient and caregiver locate and contact formal and informal social support resources.