TY - JOUR
T1 - How well do the adult social care outcomes toolkit for carers, carer experience scale and care-related quality of life capture aspects of quality of life important to informal carers in Australia?
AU - Bucholc, Jessica
AU - McCaffrey, Nikki
AU - Ugalde, Anna
AU - Muldowney, Anne
AU - Rand, Stacey
AU - Hoefman, Renske
AU - Mihalopoulos, Cathrine
AU - Engel, Lidia
N1 - Funding Information:
Open Access funding enabled and organized by CAUL and its Member Institutions. This research was supported by a grant awarded by the Faculty of Health, Deakin University. The Faculty had no role in the study design, data analysis or writing of the report.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2023, The Author(s).
PY - 2023/11
Y1 - 2023/11
N2 - Purpose: Identify aspects of quality of life (QoL) important to Australian informal carers and explore how well the Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit for Carers, Care-related Quality of Life instrument and Carer Experience Scale capture these aspects in the Australian context. Methods: Online questionnaires were completed by Australian informal carers. Socio-demographics, open-ended questions: positive/negative aspects of caring and QoL aspects missing from the instruments, and ranking of the instrument domains was used to explore the content of the instruments. Instruments were scored using preference-weighted value sets (reported in another paper). Content analysis was used to analyse the open-ended responses. Chi-squared test looked at differences in domain importance. Descriptive analyses summarised all other information. Results: Eight themes were identified: Behaviour-mood of the care recipient, Caring responsibilities, Finances, Health, Own life, Perception of carers, Relationship with care recipient and Support. Many aspects of carer QoL mentioned as missing in the instruments appeared covered by the domains, of which all were reported as important. The highest ranked domain was relationship with the care recipient. The influence of the care recipient specific support, behaviour/mood and health on carer QoL appear absent in all instruments. Conclusion: The content of the three instruments appears relevant in an Australian setting. The influence of care recipient’s health and well-being on carer QoL should be considered, along with spillover effects. A content and/or face validity analysis is required to confirm differences in item interpretation in Australian informal carers.
AB - Purpose: Identify aspects of quality of life (QoL) important to Australian informal carers and explore how well the Adult Social Care Outcomes Toolkit for Carers, Care-related Quality of Life instrument and Carer Experience Scale capture these aspects in the Australian context. Methods: Online questionnaires were completed by Australian informal carers. Socio-demographics, open-ended questions: positive/negative aspects of caring and QoL aspects missing from the instruments, and ranking of the instrument domains was used to explore the content of the instruments. Instruments were scored using preference-weighted value sets (reported in another paper). Content analysis was used to analyse the open-ended responses. Chi-squared test looked at differences in domain importance. Descriptive analyses summarised all other information. Results: Eight themes were identified: Behaviour-mood of the care recipient, Caring responsibilities, Finances, Health, Own life, Perception of carers, Relationship with care recipient and Support. Many aspects of carer QoL mentioned as missing in the instruments appeared covered by the domains, of which all were reported as important. The highest ranked domain was relationship with the care recipient. The influence of the care recipient specific support, behaviour/mood and health on carer QoL appear absent in all instruments. Conclusion: The content of the three instruments appears relevant in an Australian setting. The influence of care recipient’s health and well-being on carer QoL should be considered, along with spillover effects. A content and/or face validity analysis is required to confirm differences in item interpretation in Australian informal carers.
KW - Carer-related quality of life
KW - Informal care
KW - Outcome measurement
KW - Preference-based measures
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85162860497&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/s11136-023-03459-1
DO - 10.1007/s11136-023-03459-1
M3 - Article
C2 - 37356076
AN - SCOPUS:85162860497
SN - 0962-9343
VL - 32
SP - 3109
EP - 3121
JO - Quality of Life Research
JF - Quality of Life Research
IS - 11
ER -