Why caregivers live longer lives

Key points:

• Stress is commonly associated with a strained sense of mental well-being, but it may differ from conditions such as depression

• Caregivers have been found to live longer lives than non-caregivers

• Over 2.65 million Australians are unpaid carers, but many don’t know about the free services available to support them

A new study from a researcher at The University of Texas, Austin, is questioning the idea that family caregiving is also a risk factor for depression, despite the added stress that comes with providing support for an older person.

The study revealed that depression in adult caregivers is mostly associated with taking care of someone with significant health problems, but in general, being a caregiver was linked to reduced signs of depression.

Sae Hwang Han, the study’s author, is an assistant professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences.

He said that decades of research on this topic indicate that there are positive and negative aspects to being a caregiver.

“It’s widely assumed the negatives far outweigh the positives, that caregiving is a chronic stressor and that it contributes to worse health and well-being,” the assistant professor explained.

“[However,] the evidence doesn’t always bear that out.”

This study, published in the journal Advances in Life Course Research, is among many recent findings that have indicated that caregivers live longer than non-caregivers and that many caregivers describe caregiving as a positive experience that gives them meaning and purpose.

“Most previous studies start by identifying caregivers and compare their well-being to non-caregivers, but having a loved one experience a serious health problem in later life is, itself, a very depressing event,” Han said.

“It’s unsurprising that these studies would find a heightened risk of depression in caregivers compared to non-caregivers, who often do not have serious health problems in the family.

“That’s a misleading comparison, just as it would be misleading to compare the well-being of someone going through chemotherapy to someone who doesn’t have cancer.”

Han followed a group of adult children over the age of 50 who had a living mother and tracked changes in their mental health. Over time, as some of the mothers developed disability or cognitive impairment, the adult children became caregivers — which led Han to discover trends in how their mental well-being was affected.

Han found that adult children became more depressed as their mothers’ health deteriorated but found no evidence that becoming a caregiver worsened their depression.

“Rather, I found that caregiving alleviated the extent to which adult children became depressed in response to their mothers’ health problems, suggesting that there may be something protective about being able to help others we care about,” he added.

A 2021 study by Han and colleagues found that spouses who provided care for their partners saw similar effects, noting that the stress involved in caregiving does not mean people should dread the responsibilities of the role.

“There is no disputing that caregiving can be a very stressful experience,” he said, “but some stressful experiences also make you more resilient and help you grow.”

Can you recall a stressful experience that helped you to grow as a person? Let the team at Talking Aged Care know and subscribe to the FREE weekly newsletter for more news, information and updates.

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