Building community engagement with caregivers through online interaction and a salutogenic approach in a period of isolation

Copyright © 2024 Mas-Casadesús, de la Torre-Pérez, Reig-Garcia, Mas-Casadesús, Berenguera and Juvinyà-Canal..

Background: Informal caregivers are essential figures that deal with the effects of dependence in the elderly. However, they suffer from poorer health-related quality of life, particularly regarding mental health. Social support is crucial, but this was suspended or dramatically reduced during the Covid-19 pandemic. Salutogenesis theory explores the contributing factors for the promotion and maintenance of health. Considering all these, we offered caregivers the opportunity to join a participatory project aimed at creating communication spaces where they could share experiences, think together about potential solutions, and explore which salutogenic actions they used in their daily basis and how they had changed during Covid-19 restrictions.

Methods: We used a qualitative methodology with a socio-constructivist and phenomenological approach and purposive sampling. We organized two focus groups consisting of online semi-structured discussions with seven participants in total. Conversations were videotaped and transcribed and we conducted content thematic analyses using the NVivo software.

Results: Caregiving in our setting are primarily women with high levels of education that do not always feel comfortable with this load because it interferes with their personal and professional lives. The pandemic increased caregivers feelings of loneliness, resignation, and burden, directly affecting their mental health. Furthermore, the disappearance of prevention programs and the difficulties to access healthcare services produced negative consequences on the already fragile elderly and their family caregivers.

Conclusion: The pandemic and its restrictions exacerbated the problematics affecting informal caregivers. Although these people are aware of their situation and have valued knowledge of how to improve their health, they cannot always put it into practice. We call policymakers to reframe interventions aimed at caregivers by introducing the voice of the community in the planning and to rethink the management of vulnerable people and their carers in other potential health crises.

Medienart:

E-Artikel

Erscheinungsjahr:

2024

Erschienen:

2024

Enthalten in:

Zur Gesamtaufnahme - volume:11

Enthalten in:

Frontiers in medicine - 11(2024) vom: 15., Seite 1229395

Sprache:

Englisch

Beteiligte Personen:

Mas-Casadesús, Olga [VerfasserIn]
de la Torre-Pérez, Laura [VerfasserIn]
Reig-Garcia, Glòria [VerfasserIn]
Mas-Casadesús, Anna [VerfasserIn]
Berenguera, Anna [VerfasserIn]
Juvinyà-Canal, Dolors [VerfasserIn]

Links:

Volltext

Themen:

Caregivers
Community engagement
Covid-19 pandemic
Informal caregiving
Journal Article
Salutogenesis

Anmerkungen:

Date Revised 15.03.2024

published: Electronic-eCollection

Citation Status PubMed-not-MEDLINE

doi:

10.3389/fmed.2024.1229395

funding:

Förderinstitution / Projekttitel:

PPN (Katalog-ID):

NLM369722310