Logo

Abstract 13330: Sociodemographic and Clinical Determinants of Self-Care and Caregiver Contribution to Self-Care in a Context of Multiple Chronic Conditions

Abstract 13330: Sociodemographic and Clinical Determinants of Self-Care and Caregiver Contribution to Self-Care in a Context of Multiple Chronic Conditions

Abstract

Introduction

Multiple Chronic Conditions (MCC) are highly prevalent worldwide, especially in cardiac populations. Patients and caregivers contribute to MCC self-care, the process of maintaining illness stability and managing symptoms. The determinants of self-care remain unknown in the MCC population. Our aim was to identify sociodemographic and clinical determinants of patient and caregiver contributions to self-care in MCC.

Methods

This was a multicenter observational study in which self-care and caregiver contributions to self-care were measured in 340 dyads (patients and their caregivers) recruited from outpatient and community settings in Italy. Patients were enrolled if: ≥65 years, had heart failure, diabetes or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and one more chronic condition, and had an informal caregiver >18 years old. Patients with dementia or cancer were excluded. Self-care was measured with the Self-care of Chronic Illness Inventory and the Caregiver Contribution to Self-care of Chronic Illness Inventory. Both psychometrically sound instruments measure self-care maintenance, monitoring, and management. Multilevel Modeling Analysis was used to identify the determinants and to control for interdependence of the dyadic data.

Results

Most (54.1%) patients (mean age 76.65, SD 7.27 years) and most (72.1%) caregivers (mean age 54.32, SD 15.25 years) were female. More than one third (34.15%) of patients had heart failure. Self-care was inadequate in maintenance (65.90, SD 19,67) and management (66.39, SD 18.02). Caregiver contributions were inadequate only in monitoring (57.76, SD 13.55). Patient determinants of better self-care were older age, female gender, higher income, and higher number of medications, while cognitive impairment and diabetes predicted worse self-care. Determinants of better caregiver contributions were female gender, more caregiving hours per week and more caregiver strain, while presence of a secondary caregiver predicted worse contributions to patient self-care.

Conclusions

In the context of MCC, gender influenced self-care for both patients and caregivers. In patients, illness characteristics are important and in caregivers, caregiving responsibilities influence their contributions

Contact us

La Segreteria del Centro di Eccellenza is at your service for questions and insights

loading spinner