November Hot Topic: Celebrate National Family Caregivers Month

In less than 25 years, one in every five Americans will be over the age of 65. As the number of aging Baby Boomers increases, communities are grappling with the challenges of providing accessible transportation, appropriate affordable housing options and other supportive services for their aging citizens. National Family Caregivers Month—observed every November—draws attention to the challenges faced everyday by family caregivers in order to advocate for community-based programs to support these caregivers. Here are just some of the many resources available through CYFERnet that are focused on family caregiving issues.

Care for the Caregiver
This Ohio State University Extension fact sheet provides the caregiver ways to make sure he/she keeps healthy.

Caregiver Survival Tips
The Administration on Aging has colorful 2-page handouts featuring Caregiver Survival Tips on the web in pdf format and in English, Chinese, Russian and Spanish.

Wisconsin Alliance for Family Caregiving
This University of Wisconsin-Extension website is designed to help professionals working with family caregivers find resource materials, research, training and networking opportunities. Family caregivers will also find the site helpful for locating family caregiving classes and caregiving resources that address everyday needs and concerns of caregivers.

Caregiving Across the States: A State-by-State Resource
This interactive database, accessible in map format on the FCA website, allows caregivers and service providers to access information specific to their state. The database includes a separate profile for each state and the District of Columbia.

Well Spouse Association: Support for Spousal Caregivers
The Well Spouse Association focuses exclusively on the needs of all spouses caring for a chronically ill and/or disabled husband, wife, or partner. Includes resources, publications, and support group information.

National Caregivers Library
The National Caregivers Library is an extensive online library for caregivers. It consists articles, forms, checklists and links to topic-specific external resources.

Full Circle of Care
This website provides information on transitions of the lives of aging adults. It includes such topics as: feeling overwhelmed, taking care of the caregiver, and care giving 101.

National Alliance for Caregiving
The National Alliance for Caregiving website is dedicated to providing support to family caregivers and the professionals who help them and to increasing public awareness of issues facing family caregivers.

Balancing Work and Caregiving: Tips for Employees
This fact sheet, another from the University of Florida, provides tips for caregivers who are trying to balance their work lives with caregiving.

Coping with Caregiving: How to Manage Stress When Caring for Elderly Relatives
This publication from Purdue University Extension is aimed at helping caregivers understand ways to reduce the conflict and stress sometimes caused by the demands of caregiving.

The Caregiving Connection
This is the first issue of a newsletter series from Rutgers University for adults who are caring for older family members. Discusses the challenges and rewards and provides information on other resources for the caregivers of older adults.

Link to other "Caregiving" resources on CYFERnet

For Other Hot Topics, check here.