CC Observes Family Caregiver Month
Episode # 49
Uploaded: December 2, 2010
Running Time: 7:42
SCHMALFELDT: From the National Institutes of Health in Bethesda, Maryland, this is CLINICAL CENTER RADIO.
When a person is diagnosed with a chronic disease or medical condition and is unable to completely provide for his or her own daily care, it takes more than skilled doctors, nurses and other health care professionals to see to the individual's needs. The day-to-day duty of helping with the day-to-day challenges of living with a chronic illness or impairment often falls onto the shoulders of a family member or friend. We call these dedicated people "caregivers." And the Clinical Center at the National Institutes of Health honored the sacrifice of caregivers on November 1st, the beginning of National Family Caregiver Month.
Dr. William Blattner is currently director of the University of Maryland School of Medicine's Institute of Human Virology. For two decades, he was with the Environmental Epidemiology Branch of the National Cancer Institute. And in addition to his duties as a scientist and clinician, he is also caregiver to his son.
BLATTNER: I think the thing that is hard for me as a physician I’m used to feeling like I have something to say about what’s going on, but when you are a parent and a caregiver you have to adjust your attitude. So it’s more about being present you can’t solve the problems you live with a terrible disease that has constant setbacks and disappointments associated with it and so you learn how to… listen and try to let go of the need to control and be more of a support person. It means a lot of learning how not to solve problems but to listen to what the problem is which is hard, I like to solve problems.
SCHMALFELDT: Caregivers can be parents, husbands, wives, brothers, sisters, anyone who takes care of an individual with special needs. And being a Caregiver comes with its own forms of stress, according to guest speaker Dr. Richard Schulz, a nationally recognized expert in the field of caregiver research. Schulz is the director of the University Center for Social and Urban Research at the University of Pittsburgh. His talk—"Reflections on Three Decades of Research on Caregiving"—described some of the psychosocial and general health issues encountered by family caregivers, along with intervention research and implications for policy.
SCHULTZ: (C)aregiving poses the kinds of chronic stress experiences that some researchers at least have become very interested in studying. In some sense caregiving can be at least under some circumstances a quintessential chronic stress experience and therefore provides a platform for doing all kinds of interesting and important research. Among other things, caregiving involves being exposed to stressors that are typically uncontrollable and very often unpredictable. They generate a lot of physical and psychological strain and they generate a lot of secondary stressors in other life domains such as relationships with family members and financial strains.
SCHMALFELDT: As a caregiver for her husband, Nancy Bradfield of Harrisonburg, Va., understands how hard it can be. But don't talk to her about her husband being a burden.
BRADFIELD: I’ve never taken the view that anything that I’ve done in the way of being a caregiver has been a burden, I just don’t view it that way. You try to be as optimistic about things as you can, and I just have never viewed anything as being a burden.
SCHMALFELDT: That's not to say it's been easy, either.
BRADFIELD: On very few occasions has my husband been down, and I call that a serious problem. But very quickly we both talk about it and just through our daily devotions and everything we work past that. I am sure that there’s times where perhaps physically the patients feels worse than maybe my husband has through the experience and it would be easy to feel sorry for oneself, but I think that the caregiver can do a lot in trying to work beyond that. Very early on, we found our faith to strength and just the love and support of so many people has been very helpful too.
SCHMALFELDT: Now, I don't usually step out from behind the Clinical Center Radio microphone to express my own opinion on these stories, but I'm going to break that rule just this one time. I know that when a person is diagnosed with a chronic illness, it's not just that person who is affected. It affects everyone you know, everyone you love, all your friends and family. As a person who has been battling Parkinson's disease for nearly 11 years, I know how important the role of "caregiver" is. As my disease progresses, my wife has found herself having to add the role of "caregiver" to that of spouse and companion. It's not always been easy. But like Mrs. Bradfield said, with faith and love and strength and support of friends and family, we take it a day at a time and find our way through the rough spots. A sense of humor helps, too, as Mrs. Bradfield explained.
BRADFIELD: I think that you have to have that; if you can’t laugh at certain situations it would be pretty rough.
SCHMALFELDT: If you would like to know more about how the NIH Clinical Center observed National Family Caregiver Month, or if you're interested in learning more about any of the 1,500 clinical trials and studies performed here, log on to http://clinicalcenter.nih.gov. From America's Clinical Research Hospital, this has been CLINICAL CENTER RADIO. In Bethesda, Maryland, I'm Bill Schmalfeldt at the National Institutes of Health, an agency of the United States Department of Health and Human Services.
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