EXPRESSED INFORMATION AND RESOURCE NEEDS OF FILIAL CAREGIVERS REPORTING RECENT EXPERIENCES OF CRISIS

In this descriptive study, 92 adult children of parents with cognitive impairment preselected for recent experiences of crisis were interviewed regarding their concerns and goals for caregiving and asked to identify their most important needs for meeting parent care requirements. The 299 information and 261 resource requests identified were organized as either primary and secondary priorities according to their frequency. This organization revealed primary needs for learning regarding coping, relating, and mastery of caregiving and secondary needs relating to information about life processes (i.e., aging and chronicity), how to access resources, and freedom from threat or harm. It also revealed primary resource needs in the domains of personal assistance, assets, and getting away as well as secondary resource needs relating to knowledge and safety. The content of these needs points to adult children's awareness of the decline of their parents, personal anxiety or exhaustion, insufficient mastery of caregiving, and reluctance to continue indefinitely in the role of filial caregiver. It also indicates their awareness of insufficient preparedness for providing parent care, need for help, and desire to relate more effectively with others. These findings have implications for educational research to develop interventions that might facilitate filial maturity and the socialization of adult children into the role of caregiver in critical parent care situations.