Interactions between chronically ill people and family caregivers

This study illuminates the interactions between chronically ill people and their family caregivers. The perspective of the caregivers is examined. Caregivers safeguard the care of their relatives often for many years. Their need of social support is still unrecognised. In particular there is a lack of knowledge about the experience of family caring relationships and their arrangement from the perspective of the participants. This knowledge is essential to improve nursing interventions. A phenomenological approach was chosen for this inquiry. Semistructured interviews with 15 elderly caregivers were conducted and analysed.The key concept of the analysis is the engaged work of caring. As a typical form of coping with caring needs in families the engaged work of caring has a momentum, which is addressed as logic of familiy care. This logic is based on three structuring elements: the attitude of caring, the caring activities and the emotional experience of caring. Depending on how these elements are formed, a rather supportive or burdening momentum develops. The analysis of the findings of this study gives important advice for a conception of counseling of caregivers