Exploring the Elder Care Experience – Showcasing Disabled Elders’ Primary Caretakers as an Example

• Main Authors: Chu, Su-Mei, 朱素梅
• Other Authors: Ju,Mei-Chen
• Format: Others
• Language: zh-TW
• Published: 2015
• Online Access: http://ndltd.ncl.edu.tw/handle/ep46td

碩士 === 玄奘大學 === 社會福利與社會工作學系碩士班 === 104 === A family member who should be unable to look after whose living needs and in need of relying on family members’ care can pose a detrimental impact to the entire family when attempting to embrace the drastic changes. The study adopts the qualitative research methodology and the means of “semi-structural in-depth interview” to derive the data, by focusing on interviewing the caretakers of six families with disabled elders as the study subjects, which describes the process of their caring for disabled elder and their living experience and reflection, centering around exploring the experiences, in an effort to decipher the stress the primary caretakers are put under during the period and their means of adjustment and reflection towards life. The study has discovered, through data analysis, that the common experiences shared by respondents caring for disabled elder are: I. By conventional cultural concept, a majority has been for the female family members to shoulder the caring responsibility. II. Long-term care not only put a heavy burden on the caretaker’s mental and physical endurance as they fall prey to worries and depression. III. The caring techniques should be learned to serve the needs so as to ease the frustration in the care process. IV. The caretaker becomes more aware of the fragility and tenacity of life and a closer bond to family members. The study presents some constructive recommendations as derived from its recapitulation, in anticipate that all sectors of the society can pay more attention to the circumstances and needs of the primary caretakers to disabled elders and the general gerontological care issues as a whole.