United States: Finding A Balance Between Conflicting Responsibilities:Work And Caring For Aging Parents

Originally published in “Living in Balance” Magazine

Trying to manage the care of aging parents or a disabled family member, while trying to meet other work and family responsibilities is a challenge. One that faces a rapidly growing segment of our population. As the huge demographic "bubble" in our population-the 76 million baby boomers born between 1946 and 1964 grow older, so do their parents.

According to the U.S census bureau, a baby boomer turns 55 every 7 seconds for the next 20 years. Their parents are living longer than any generation in history. In fact the fastest growing age group in our society is not all those babies we see in strollers-it’s those over 85.

While longevity is something we all hope for ourselves and our loved ones, it can be a mixed blessing. While new medications, technology and surgical procedures have prolonged our lives, for many it means needing assistance from others to get through each day. Help with things like bathing dressing, mobility, toileting, managing money, shopping, meal preparation and house cleaning is needed by our parents, grandparents, or other family members.

An elderly parent may choose to move to a retirement community or even to a nursing home to receive the care they need when they can no longer manage on their own. But most want to live out their lives in their own homes for as long as possible. With the right kind of help - nursing services, home health aides and someone to help with errands, housekeeping and yard work, they can do so. While services are available, especially for those who can pay for them, finding your way through the confusing and uncoordinated maze that is the American long term care system can be a daunting task to even the most dedicated long distance caregiver.

Caregiving takes a heavy toll on work and family life. Among those who have provided hands-on care, 67 percent reported that it has had a significant impact on their family lives, and 41 percent reported that it had a significant impact on their work. More than 10 percent of those who have provided long-term care assistance said they had given up promotions or jobs as a result.

As the phenomenon of working and long distance caregivers continue to grow, employers, are getting a wake up call from several studies published recently. These studies, funded by AARP, Metropolitan Life Insurance, The National Alliance for Caregivers, The National Alzheimer’s Association, and others estimate the costs of this burgeoning crisis to employers to be as much as $29 billion annually. These costs are due to lost time at work by caregivers, time spent on the phone at work trying to resolve caregiving problems and arrange and monitor caregiving.

An increasing number of employees who are leaving their jobs to care for, or at least be closer to, the family member needing help. When you add geographic distance to the caregiving mix it can become a true nightmare. As our economy becomes steadily more global in nature, this problem is certain to get worse as boomers and their parents age.

In a society that has become increasingly mobile in recent years, it is not uncommon to find different generations of an extended family, living hundreds, or even thousands, of miles apart. The working caregiver may find themselves in the difficult bind of a demanding job, that may require both long hours and lots of travel-in addition to other family responsibilities.

When the long distance caregiver tries to contact local social service or health care agencies for help they discover that a frightening phenomenon is emerging in America; while the population of frail older persons is growing steadily, the care and services available for them is shrinking rapidly. Steep cuts are occurring in the once generous Medicare home health care benefit. With billions of federal dollars now needed to finance the war on terrorism and to strengthen our economy by supporting critical industries such as airlines, funds for social and health care programs for frail elders will continue to grow scarce.

Once they recover from the shock that Medicare and other health care insurance for retirees, covers very little of the care and support needed by their parents, long distance caregivers, as well as those with demanding jobs who live closer to home, are discovering that family caregivers must seek assistance in the growing private marketplace. A valuable resource for the stressed our working caregiver, may well be their employer.

Many large corporations are now responding to these pressures by retaining the services of national elder care companies to help them to ease the caregiving burdens faced by their employees. The costs of these services, however, make them out of reach for many employers who are struggling to keep up with employee health care costs that are rising once again, after several years of stability.

Several companies have attempted to provide solutions to both stressed out employees and to employers concerned with the associated costs in the form of lower productivity, reluctance to re-locate, loss of workers-especially women- who feel they must resign to care for aging parents and the increased incidence of "presenteeism’, a corollary of absenteeism where the employee, having used up all of their sick leave and vacation time continues to come to work but is too preoccupied with chronic elder caregiving issues to be very productive.

Work Life elder care benefits programs come in a variety of formats with services as simple as a toll free call center or web site with information about federal and state eldercare programs, to programs with a long and growing list of services, discounts and even assistance by experienced professional geriatric specialists. At companies such as MBNA Corp. and First Tennessee Bank, which ranked highest overall, family-friendliness is ingrained in both culture and business strategy. There, and at Barnett Banks, Motorola, and Sequent Computer Systems, among others, workers testified to the success of strategies designed to ease work-family tensions.

Because the costs of long-term care services are expected to grow to more than quadruple today’s costs by 2030, the importance of planning now can not be underestimated. This planning must involve not only our political leaders, but the assumption of greater personal responsibility and an increased role by employers.

A study commissioned by the American Council of Life Insurers titled "Who Will Pay for the Baby Boomers' Long-Term Care Needs?" projects that total national expenditures for nursing home care could reach $330 billion -- equal to today's entire Social Security budget.

These findings "illustrate the importance of taking personal responsibility for your financial future and for your future long-term care needs," say the study’s authors .

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.