Caregiving: Your GoodRx Guide

Who is a caregiver?

A caregiver helps a person who can’t independently care for themselves. Often, this means taking care of an older adult or someone with a terminal health condition. It can also be caregiving for a child with a serious illness or special needs.

Some people work outside the home as professional caregivers. But here we will be talking about unpaid caregiving. This kind of caregiver usually helps a family member or someone close to them. This might be a:

• Parent

• Spouse

• Relative

• Neighbor

• Close friend 

A caregiver may live with the person receiving care. But a caregiver might also be a friend or family member who lives nearby. Sometimes it even means coordinating or providing services from a distance. 

What is the role of a caregiver?

A caregiver’s role often depends on the person who needs care. It also depends on the amount of outside resources that are available to help. 

A caregiver’s responsibilities can vary in:

• Intensity: Some caregivers need to provide medical and physical support round the clock, like for someone who had a serious stroke. In other cases, the caregiver may only need to help with certain tasks, like grocery shopping or bathing. 

• Length of time: Sometimes a person’s needs last for a limited time. An example of this is someone who is recovering from a major surgery. But, in many cases, the person’s needs are for a permanent condition.

• Stability: Someone's needs can vary from day to day or be unpredictable. This may occur in mental health conditions, for example. But with something like a stroke, the level of caregiving may be somewhat stable. 

• Path: Many kinds of caregiving become more complex over time. An example is caring for someone with dementia. And many caregivers also have an important role in meeting physical, emotional, and spiritual needs at the end of life.

What does a caregiver do?

It may be obvious what kind of help a person needs. But a lot of caregiving goes on behind the scenes. And, in many situations, it changes with time or circumstances. 

Caregiving can include:

• Household tasks: cleaning, laundry, and meals 

• Organizational support: bills, finances, and appointments  

• Hygiene: dressing, bathing, going to the bathroom, and brushing hair and teeth 

• Safety: promoting safety inside the home

• Mobility: getting around at home and outside of the house  

• Emotional health: communication, companionship, and support 

• Medical needs: medications, appointments, at-home testing, and wound care

Caregiving also happens in different forms and places. A caregiver may:

• Live with the person receiving care

• Provide in-person care but not live with them

• Provide help alongside a professional caregiver 

• Give extra care to someone living in an assisted living or nursing facility

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What are the challenges of caregiving?

Many people find meaning and purpose in caregiving. But there are also plenty of challenges and concerns. 

Caregiving can take a toll on the caregiver’s own physical health. Caregivers have more health conditions like cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and cancer. They report more pain. And they have higher levels of stress hormones and inflammation.

Mental health is also a challenge. Stress, burnout, and depression are real concerns. Caregiving can also strain relationships with family and friends.  

Caregiving can be a financial stress. Caregivers may have to take days off work, lose promotions, or use their own money to help pay for care.

Many caregivers seek education and training in caregiving. This includes learning about healthcare and safety as well as making legal and financial decisions.

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What does a caregiver need?

When you’re busy taking care of others, it helps to remember your oxygen mask. You know that announcement they make on airplanes, how you should put on your own oxygen mask before helping someone else? That also applies to caregivers.

Taking care of yourself might not be at the top of your to-do list. But it’s important for your long-term physical and mental health as well as the work that you’re doing right now. Experts recommend starting with reminders like these:

• Eat a healthy diet.

• Stay active with exercise you enjoy.

• Get enough sleep.

• Try deep-breathing exercises or meditation.

• Pay attention to your own health (like medications and healthcare visits).

• Stay involved with activities you enjoy.

• Carve out time for your personal relationships.

• Say “no” when you need to, and ask others for help.

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Resources and support

Taking care of someone else requires a strong support network. It might help to know that, as a caregiver, you’re not alone. Nearly 1 in 5 people in the U.S. are providing unpaid care for someone who needs it. But when you’re in the middle of it yourself, even looking for help can feel overwhelming.

Your local government and social service agencies can be good places to start. Many communities have programs for older adults and people with special needs. 

You can also check out these online resources:

• End-of-life care:

  • Palliative care

  • Hospice

• Government programs:

  • Medicare 

  • Medicaid

  • Social security

• Chronic conditions:

  • Alzheimer’s Association

  • Parkinson’s Foundation 

  • American Stroke Association

  • American Cancer Society

  • National Cancer Institute

  • Autism Speaks

  • National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI)

  • Christopher & Dana Reeves Foundation

• Caregiver support:

  • ARCH National Respite Network

  • Well Spouse Association

  • Family Caregiver Alliance

  • CaringInfo

  • AARP

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