PURPOSE Antiepileptic drugs are a potentially effective treatment for epilepsy. Side-effects are, however, common and the negative consequences necessitate treatment ranging from minor interventions to very expensive hospitalization. This analysis has been conducted to provide insight into the costs of side-effects due to antiepileptic drugs in The Netherlands from a societal perspective. MET...

BACKGROUND Empirical evidence shows that the relationship between health-seeking behaviour and diverse gender elements, such as gendered social status, social control, ideology, gender process, marital status and procreative status, changes across settings. Given the high relevance of social settings, this paper intends to explore how gender elements interact with health-seeking practices among...

BACKGROUND The future of health care services in the European Union faces the triple challenges of aging, fiscal restriction, and inclusion. Co-production offers ways to manage informal care resources to help them cater for the growing needs of elderly people. Social media (SM) is seen as a critical enabler for co-production. OBJECTIVE The objective of this study was to investigate how SM-pri...

Most estimates of the cost of informal caregiving in patients with Alzheimer's disease (AD) remain cross-sectional. Longitudinal estimates of informal caregiving hours and costs are less frequent and are from assessments covering only short periods of time. The objectives of this study were to estimate long-term trajectories of the use and cost of informal caregiving for patients with AD and th...

BACKGROUND There is a lack of studies of the size of burden associated with informal care giving in psychosis. AIMS To evaluate the objective and subjective burden of informal care giving to patients with psychoses, and to compare a diary and recall method for assessments of objective burden. METHOD Patients and their informal caregivers were recruited...

BACKGROUND We aimed to estimate the monetary value of informal care of disabled people with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) in Spain and to identify the main determinants of the time involved in informal caregiving. METHODS We used the Survey on Disabilities, Autonomy and Dependency carried out in Spain in 2008 to obtain information on disabled individuals with COPD and their inf...

The needs of lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans (LGBT) people with dementia are poorly recognised. This is due partly to assumptions that all older people are heterosexual or asexual. One quarter of gay or bisexual men and half of lesbian or bisexual women have children, compared with 90% of heterosexual women and men, which means LGBT older adults are more likely to reside in care homes. Older L...

BACKGROUND The sustainability of long-term care (LTC) is a prominent policy priority in many Western countries. LTC is one of the most pressing fiscal issues for the growing population of elderly people in the European Union (EU) Member States. Country recommendations regarding LTC are prominent under the EU's European Semester. METHODS This paper examines challenges related to the financial-...

Demented persons in the process of slowly becoming dependent have to rely on the assistance of others. These others are health professionals (formal care), on the one hand and family carers (informal care) on the other hand. The latter, whether or not they have chosen to play a role which is hardly defined officially, have to face many difficult situations such as complicated access to care due...

BACKGROUND The presence of incontinence symptoms might affect the quality of life (QoL) of those providing informal care to people suffering from them, causing social isolation, financial problems, psychological and physical exhaustion. AIMS This study aimed at assessing whether urinary and/or fecal incontinence in people aged 60 and over affects the level of burden in their informal caregive...