General and gender-specific dynamics determining the health status of employed family caregivers

ABSTRACT

We examined whether gender plays a role in how financial strain moderates the relationship between health status and objective burden among employed family caregivers. Using data from “Caregiving in the U.S., 2015,” the sample included 704 employed caregivers (311 males and 393 females) of adults 50 years of age and older. The relationship between objective caregiver burden and self-reported health was moderated by financial strain in the full sample. However, in separate analyses by gender, this moderated relationship was limited to females. Findings inform interventions to improve caregiver health while accounting for the financial strain experienced by women in particular.

KEYWORDS:

• Caregiving
• employment
• gender differences

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Data availability statement

The data that support the findings of this study are openly available at https://www.caregiving.org/research/open-data/.