Informal carers play a vital role in post-diagnostic dementia care, including rehabilitation, yet little is known about how broader caregiving contexts, particularly subjective carer burden, relate to the health and well-being of carers and their care recipients with dementia receiving rehabilitation.

This poster presents two complementary studies examining whether broader caregiving contexts (e.g., caregiving hours, co-residence, carer-care recipient relationship, carer burden) are associated with health and well-being outcomes for care dyads within dementia rehabilitation, both at baseline and over time (12 months), using data from the Interdisciplinary Home-bAsed Reablement Programme (I-HARP), a multicentre pragmatic trial in Sydney, Australia.

Our findings suggest that cross-sectionally and longitudinally, higher subjective carer burden was the strongest caregiving context variable associated with poorer health and well-being outcomes for both carers (health-related quality of life, HRQoL) and care recipients (functional ability, depression, self- and proxy-rated quality of life, and HRQoL). Carer burden also mediated certain associations, for instance, the baseline association between additional caring responsibilities and the care recipient's functional ability. Compared to spousal/partner carers, extended family members (e.g., siblings, in-laws, friends) were associated with poorer care recipient well-being, including depression and quality of life.

These findings further highlight that subjective carer burden has both short- and longer-term effects on functional and psychosocial outcomes for care recipients and carer HRQoL within the rehabilitation context. Future rehabilitation programs should assess and address subjective carer burden within broader caregiving contexts, and tailor support to carers, particularly non-spousal carers.