Underemployment among mothers of children with intellectual disabilities
Background Mothers with lifelong care responsibilities might involuntarily be non-employed or work part-time, both of which are defined as “underemployment.” This study aimed to investigate who these underemployed mothers are and what are the factors associated with such employment hardship when having a child with intellectual disability (ID). Method An interview survey was conducted in 2011 in two local authorities of Taiwan on 876 working-age mothers with a child with intellectual disability; 514 of them were working part-time/non-employed and chosen as participants of this study. Results The mothers with a younger child with intellectual disability, a higher level of education, a lower …
Effect of perceived stigmatisation on the quality of life among ageing female family carers: a comparison of carers of adults with intellectual disability and carers of adults with mental illness
Background Little account has been taken of quality of life (QoL) among family carers of adults with an intellectual disability (ID) and family carers of adults with a mental illness (MI), particularly the female ageing carers' perceived stigma. We explore whether there are differences in the significant predictors of female ageing family carers' QoL between family carers of adults with ID and family carers of adults with MI and aim to examine the effect of these differences in stigma on carer QoL between the two groups. Methods A structural survey interview was administered to 350 female family carers supporting persons with ID and 66 female carers supporting persons with MI; the carers …
Community Care in Taiwan
SUMMARY This article explores the policy definitions and the funder roles of central and local governments in community care in Taiwan. The notion of community care has been adopted in Taiwan following the model of Hong Kong but the main question of the article is whether this has resulted in actual service provisions at the community level, forming an alternative to institutional care. The data has been collected from several sources: policy documents, official statistics, surveys, general reports, funding provision reports, and empirical studies. The results show that neither central nor local authorities are seriously involved in caring for elderly people or persons with disabilities in …
Models of long-term care use among older people with disabilities in Taiwan: institutional care, community care, live-in migrant care and family care
The four main models of long-term care (LTC) for older people in Taiwan are institutional care, community & home-based care, live-in migrant care, and family care. This study aims to examine the factors associated with the four above-mentioned LTC models, using the Andersen model as its framework for analysis. Data were from the 2005 National Taiwanese Health Interview Survey (n=30,680) and in this study 592 over-65-year-old persons who require personal care in daily life were included. The findings showed that the majority of older people with care needs lived with family and were cared only by their family. The second largest group were those older people who were cared by migrant care wo…
Predictors of Job Satisfaction among Staff in Residential Settings for Persons with Intellectual Disabilities: A Comparison between Three Residential Models
Background This cross-sectional study aims to assess whether there are differences in staff job satisfaction, including organizational and individual characteristics, between three residential models for adults with intellectual disabilities (small residential home, group home and institution) and to investigate the organizational and individual variables associated with staff job satisfaction. Methods A standardized self-administered questionnaire (Job Satisfaction Survey) was distributed together with demographic questions between April 2007 and June 2007. In total, 1301 staff members completed the questionnaire. Results We found that staff working at small homes had a significantly hi…
Lost in translation: implementing personal assistance in an East Asian context
Since 2012, Taiwanese citizens with disabilities have been entitled to personal assistance from local authorities. To explore current features of personal assistance and barriers to its implementat...
Reconciliation of work and care among lone mothers of adults with intellectual disabilities: the role and limits of care capital.
In this study, the concept of social capital is applied to an exploration of Guanxi (social networking to create good relationships) among working lone mothers of adults with intellectual disabilities (ID) in Taiwan. Using in-depth interviews, this study explores the role of social capital, here referred to as 'care capital', in making it possible for working lone mothers to combine their roles as family carers and workers. Eleven divorced or widowed mothers combining their paid work with long-term care responsibilities were recruited from a survey or through NGOs and were interviewed at their home between October 2008 and July 2010. An interpretative phenomenological approach was adopted f…
Universal Breadwinner Versus Universal Caregiver Model : Fathers’ Involvement in Caregiving and Well-Being of Mothers of Offspring with Intellectual Disabilities
Background The universal breadwinner model means both parents are employed; while the universal caregiver model implies that the father's hours of caregiving are equal or higher to those of the mother. This study aims to examine the hypothesis that the universal caregiver model is more related to the overall well-being of mothers of children with intellectual disabilities than the universal breadwinner model. Methods Face-to-face interview surveys were conducted in 2011 in Taiwan with 876 working-age mothers who had an offspring with intellectual disabilities. The survey included 574 mothers living with their husbands who became our participants. Results Both anova and regression analyses i…
Application of the International classification of functioning, disability and health in Taiwan : victory of the medical model
AbstractSince July 2012, eligibility for disability benefits and services in Taiwan has been assessed based on the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health. This study examines disabled people’s experiences of this new assessment system: does it incorporate the social model or a multidimensional understanding of disability and assess the needs of disabled people adequately? In-depth interviews were employed with 24 disabled persons to answer these questions from the perspective of disabled people. The findings show that the new assessment model is still medicalised: social roles and social participation are not considered, the assessment process is dominated by pro…
Ageing in place together : older parents and ageing offspring with intellectual disability
AbstractLimited research has been conducted about ageing in place among older parents who co-habit with their ageing offspring with intellectual disability (ID). This study aims to explore which older parents would choose ageing in place together with their ageing offspring with ID instead of moving and what factors are associated with this choice. A face-to-face interview was conducted using the ‘housing pathways’ framework with older parents (⩾60 years) co-habiting with their ageing offspring with ID (⩾40 years) from two local authorities in Taiwan. In total, 237 families completed our census survey between June and September 2015. The results showed that 61.6 per cent of the participants…
Impact of care responsibilities on women’s employment: a comparison between European and East Asian welfare states
ABSTRACTWomen with care responsibilities tend to reduce their labour market activity and to work part time, even if there are cross-national differences. Empirical research often analyses this separately for childcare and elderly care, and studies are usually limited to Western societies. This article aims to explore to what extent women’s care responsibilities for children and older people impact on women’s labour market integration and how this impact differs in the context of different welfare states in Europe and Asia. The analysis is based on data from a new comparative survey for four cities (Jyvaskyla, Hamburg, Bologna and Hsinchu) in four countries (Finland, Germany, Italy and Taiwa…
Depressive symptoms in older female carers of adults with intellectual disabilities
Background This survey study aims to examine the prevalence and factors associated with depressive symptoms among primary older female family carers of adults with intellectual disabilities (ID). Method In total, 350 female family carers aged 55 and older took part and completed the interview in their homes. The survey package contained standardised scales to assess carer self-reported depressive symptoms, social support, caregiving burden and disease and health, as well as adult and carer sociodemographic information. Multiple linear regressions were used to identify the factors associated with high depressive symptoms in carers. Results Between 64% and 72% of these carers were classifi…
Respite care as a community care service: Factors associated with the effects on family carers of adults with intellectual disability in Taiwan
This study examines the effects and associated factors of respite care, which was legislated as a community service for adults with an intellectual disability (ID) in Taiwan in 1997.A total of 116 family carers who live with an adult with ID and have utilised the respite care program were surveyed using standardised measures.The results suggest that the most notable effects of respite care include improvement in the carers' social support and life satisfaction, and relief of psychological stress and overall burden of care. The factors associated with these effects include the way the participants have used the respite care and the users' individual characteristics.How families used the resp…
Job satisfaction and quality of life among home care workers: a comparison of home care workers who are and who are not informal carers
ABSTRACTBackground: Job satisfaction and quality of life among home care workers who serve simultaneously as informal carers for their own family members have seldom been explored. This study examined how this dual role influences job satisfaction and quality of life by comparing these dual carers with home care workers who do not provide informal care. The study also explored whether the factors related to job satisfaction and quality of life between these two groups were different.Method: Standardized self-administered questionnaires (Job Satisfaction Survey, the World Health Organization Quality of Life (WHOQOL) scales and various social demographic questions) were administered to the tw…
Well‐being among employed and non‐employed caregiving women in Taiwan
Chou Y-C, Kroger T, Chiao C, Pu C-Y. Well-being among employed and non-employed caregiving women in Taiwan This study addressed various groups of non-employed/employed and non-caring/caring women in Taiwan. Data from the 2006 National Taiwanese Women Survey (at age 16–64, n= 6,017) were analysed to determine whether there are differences in terms of well-being, as measured by self-rated health and family life satisfaction, between women who work and/or care and between different carer groups. Other factors associated with well-being of carers of young children (n= 1,697) were also analysed. The results showed that non-employed carers of disabled adults stood out as the most disadvantaged gr…
Outcomes of a new residential scheme for adults with intellectual disabilities in Taiwan: a 2-year follow-up
Background The Taiwanese government launched a new programme in November 2004 to support adults with intellectual disabilities living in smaller facilities. This paper aims to evaluate the service outcomes of this new residential scheme over 2 years including those residents who moved from an institution and those who moved from their family. Methods A one-group repeated-measures analysis was conducted for five interviews after the adults with intellectual disabilities entered the new environment. Forty-nine adults were initially studied (T1) and 29 adults remained in the homes until the end of the study (T5). Results This study found significant improvements over the 2 years in the resi…
Caring, employment, and quality of life: comparison of employed and nonemployed mothers of adults with intellectual disability.
Abstract The effects of caregiving on mothers of adults with intellectual disability was examined by determining whether there are differences in quality of life and related factors between mothers with different employment status. Study participants were 302 working-age mothers who had adult children with intellectual disability based on the 2008 census survey on intellectual disability carried out in Hsinchu, City, Taiwan. Results revealed that nonemployed mothers are more likely to have a lower level of health status, including the WHOQOL Physical Health domain, than are mothers employed fulltime. Multiple regression analysis showed that mothers' quality of life was significantly determi…