Abstract
To describe the development of measures used between 1993 and 2016 to evaluate time use by family caregivers of elderly with dementia and to find out the patterns of time use identified in the literature. An integrative review of articles was performed, indexed by the following terms: time use management, family caregiver and elderly. A total of 17 articles were found, of which seven were methodological. Among these seven articles, five were psychometric. The most frequently used measures were self-reporting (matrices, questionnaires and inventories), validated through objective measures of occurrence and duration. Longitudinal, prospective, clinical and correlational studies showed that care time covaries with the receptors' dependence and that the caregivers' subjective well-being is more affected by the time restriction to free choice activities than the burden resulting from obligatory activities. Final considerations: Valid self-reporting measures are widely used nowadays and they are considered to be effective to assess the objective and subjective costs of health care for dementia.
Highlights
The first study on time use by the elderly was performed by Beyer and Woods (1963)(1), based on the time budget methodology, meaning “daily estimates of time spent on activities”
In light of the review and literature previously described, the present study aimed to identify the main theoretical and methodological developments in research on time use by family caregivers of elderly with dementia, throughout the 25 years that followed Lawton’s pioneering initiative to create valid measures for this phenomenon; as well as to find out what was revealed by these measures in terms of time management in support activities and in concurrent activities of a personal or social, obligatory or discretionary nature, performed by these individuals
The present study aimed to describe the development of measures used to assess time use by family caregivers of elderly with dementia, according to data shown in the literature between 1993, the year of the first publication on this theme, and 2016; as well as to identify the patterns of time use by caregivers found in the literature
Summary
The first study on time use by the elderly was performed by Beyer and Woods (1963)(1), based on the time budget methodology, meaning “daily estimates of time spent on activities”. In Chapin’s categorization, obligatory activities and work overlap, just as discretionary activities and pleasure overlap This categorization was widely adopted in subsequent studies, despite the limitations inherent to the fact that elements of choice and obligation are not necessarily excluding, as they are not always clearly identifiable. Elderly choices of leisure activities are controlled by the social values acquired during youth, current biological and social competences, changes to personal needs due to aging and facilitating or hindering effects of the external environment. This point of view guided the subsequent study on activities with institutionalized vulnerable elderly and it is considered to be valid until now
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