Aggravating Factors and Adverse Impacts of Subjective Burden of Family Caregivers of Schizophrenia Patients

Page: 413-416
Roby James and Joy Tungol (The Graduate School, University of Santo Tomas, Manila, Philippines)

The demanding role of caregiving of schizophrenia patients requires considerable amount of energy and time over a long duration, resulting in exhaustion that eventually affects the caregiver negatively. Burden refers to the negative feeling and subsequent strain experienced by the family members as a result of caring a schizophrenia patient. Subjective caregiver burden indicates caregivers’ own burden perceived personally, which results in affecting the overall well-being of the caregiver. Considerable amount of stress experienced by the caregivers themselves may push them to have a poor quality of life if they fail to cope with the stress resulting from the process of caregiving. The impairment of the caregiving role has negative impact on the patient’s well-being, course and prognosis of the disease. Though psycho-education and cognitive behavioral therapy were helpful to address many of the caregiver issues, they were not adequate enough to address the real issues of the caregivers of schizophrenia patients. Future researches are to be designed, taking in to consideration the subjective burden of the family caregivers of schizophrenia patients to help them perform their caregiving role effectively.