She leaves the house, but she takes the worries. How much longer will they be able to afford the home health aide? How well will her mother do on the new medications? When will she and her husband have some much-needed private time? When will her boss grow tired of her requests for a longer lunch break and an earlier work day?

Susan did her best to get seven hours of sleep last night, but with the worries weighing so heavy that she feels as if she hasn’t slept in years.

According to 2006 The MetLife Caregiving Cost Study, sponsored by MetLife Mature Market Institute and National Alliance for Caregiving, at least 6 out of 10 employed family caregivers make work-related adjustments for their caregiving responsibilities: 9% leave the workforce and 10% reduce their hours from full-time to part-time.

Caregiving is hard. Caregiving and working is really hard. In our free e-book, The Working Family Caregiver, we offer some quick, simple tips to help you manage two demanding roles that can complicate life. We hope the tips help you manage your experiences so you have minimal regrets.

Download The Working Family Caregiver, a free e-book, here.

Resources

1. Join Caregiving.com (it’s free!) to connect with other family caregivers. Sign up here.

2. Schedule a complimentary coaching call with Denise Brown, professsioal life coach and founder, Caregiving.com to learn how coaching can help you manage caregiving and your career. Make your appointment here.

3. Our caregiving books are good for your heart and soul. They’ll help you start your day (Good Morning!), find greater happiness (Take Time), feel understood (Take Comfort and Take Comfort, Too) and lead you through your caregiving years (The Caregiving Years). Through January 15, you can buy two books and get the second at 50% off. Buy here and use coupon code SECONDHALF305.

4. Finally, in case you missed it, download The Working Family Caregiver, a free e-book, here.

Denise M. Brown, founder of Caregiving.com, caregiver advocate and my good friend was recently quoted in a New York Times article addressing the challenges of caregiving while working. As a caregiver who is both an employee and a manager, I have a bit of a unique perspective about caregiving while working. While caring for my brother, I manage a law firm but also have several employees who are or have been a caregiver to a family member.

As a manager, I am personally very supportive of my employees when they have these situations and work with them so they know how important they are to our firm but also so they don’t stress about not being at work while handling caregiving duties. It may sometimes involve me running a little interference between the partners (my bosses) and the staff member but it is worth it. I have talented people working for me and I like to think we can work together to come up with a solution that works for both the business and the employee.

I feel lucky that my position can be somewhat flexible because I can bring work home or work on a weekend if I have to miss a few hours for Robert’s doctor appointments or take a day off to move him (or meet with his care facility). As Denise suggests in a related post, I keep the partners who “need to know” in the know about my situation and they have been very supportive and understanding.

One of the issues I’ve run across as an employee is being able to take sick time to care for my brother. The definition of “family” under the Family Medical Leave Act (FMLA) and the California Family Rights Act (CFRA) includes caring for parents, children or a spouse. Siblings and grandparents are excluded at this time and many employers (including mine) follow the FMLA and CFRA definition for our sick time rules. Since I began caring for Robert, I’ve had to take vacation days to handle Robert’s doctor appointments, helmet fittings, emergency room visits as well as the time spent placing Robert in a care facility and all that entails (which adds up to a lot of hours!). So while my bank of sick time is maxed out (because I rarely take a sick day), I have exhausted much of my vacation time (and not because I take a lot of long vacations).

Only recently was I actually able to work something out with my employer so that I will now be allowed to take sick days when caring for Robert but it took a lot of effort and was only changed because I met some very specific requirements necessary to do so (one of which is being employed with them for so darn long.). I appreciate this change but I cannot get those vacation days back from the last few years of caring for Robert.

However, I am one of the lucky ones – many times people have to take time off without pay and do not have their job protected in order to care for a family member not currently included in the FMLA and CFRA definition of family.

Several times, the California legislature has passed legislation to expand the definition of family under CFRA and several times it was vetoed (ugh – thanks, Arnold!). Sandre Swanson (D-16) is trying again and has introduced AB-59. The California Work and Family Coalition has prepared a sample letter of support to send to Assemblymember Swanson. It may be too late for this to get passed this year (in May it was “held under submission” which doesn’t sound promising) but if we push, perhaps we can get momentum going for it next year. Please help to get this expanded definition of family through the legislature and finally signed into law.

We (as in caregivers and reasonable people) already know what family means but we need to help the legislature properly and legally define it in order to expand protection for the millions of working caregivers.

I appreciate your help in this endeavor!

The researchers analyzed data from the National Health and Retirement Study (HRS) to determine the extent to which older adult children provide care to their parents.  They also studied gender roles, the impact of caregiving on careers and the potential cost to the caregiver in lost wages and future retirement income.

“Nearly 10 million adult children over the age of 50 care for their aging parents,” said Sandra Timmermann, Ed.D., director of the MetLife Mature Market Institute. “Assessing the long-term financial impact of caregiving for aging parents on caregivers themselves, especially those who must curtail their working careers to do so, is especially important, since it can jeopardize their future financial security.”

In addition, the study found that:

• Adult children age 50+ who work and provide care to a parent are more likely than those who do not provide care, to report that their health is fair or poor.

• The percentage of adult children providing personal care and/or financial assistance to a parent has more than tripled over the past 15 years and currently represents a quarter of adult children, mainly Baby Boomers.  Working and non-working adult children are almost equally likely to provide care to parents in need.

• Overall, caregiving sons and daughters provide comparable care in many respects, but daughters are more likely to provide basic care (i.e., help with dressing, feeding and bathing) and sons are more likely to provide financial assistance defined as providing $500 or more within the past two years.  Twenty-eight percent of women provide basic care, compared with 17% of men.

• For women, the total individual amount of lost wages due to leaving the labor force early because of caregiving responsibilities equals $142,693.  The estimated impact of caregiving on lost Social Security benefits is $131,351.  A very conservative estimated impact on pensions is approximately $50,000.  Thus, in total, the cost impact of caregiving on the individual female caregiver in terms of lost wages and Social Security benefits equals $324,044.

• For men, the total individual amount of lost wages due to leaving the labor force early because of caregiving responsibilities equals $89,107.  The estimated impact of caregiving on lost Social Security benefits is $144,609.  Adding in a conservative estimate of the impact on pensions at $50,000, the total impact equals $283,716 for men, or an average of $303,880 for male or female caregivers age 50+ who care for a parent.

“These family caregivers, the celebrated members of the sandwich generation, are juggling their responsibilities to their own families and to their parents,” said Gail Hunt, president and CEO of the National Alliance for Caregiving.  “There is also evidence that caregivers experience considerable health issues as a result of their focus on caring for others.  The need for flexibility in the workplace and in policies that would benefit working caregivers is likely to increase in importance as more working caregivers approach their own retirement, while still caring for their loved ones.”

“As the percentage of employees who are caregivers continues to grow, there will be greater demand on employers for help and support.  There are many workplace resources and programs that can be made available that benefit all stakeholders since financial stress can negatively impact physical health and workplace productivity,” adds Timmermann.

The study contains implications for individuals, employers and policymakers.  It points out that employers can provide retirement planning and stress management information and can assist employees with accommodations like flex-time and family leave. Individuals, it says, should consider their own health when caregiving and should prepare financially for their own retirement.  Policymakers are made aware of the fact that more states are considering paid family leave, especially as it is accrued through workers’ compensation funds.  On the federal level, a voluntary long-term care insurance program is part of the Affordable Care Act and will likely increase public awareness of the issue.

The MetLife Study of Caregiving Costs to Working Caregivers provides updated information first reported in two MetLife studies: Sons at Work: Balancing Employment and Eldercare  (2003) and The MetLife Juggling Act Study: Balancing Caregiving with Work and the Costs Involved (1999).

To learn more about the survey, visit here.

Related Articles

• A 15th Year Celebration (caregiving.com)
• Caregiving. Again. (caregiving.com)

We took those suggestions for wellness polls and created this week’s poll.

So, working family caregivers: Which welllness program works for you?

Related Articles

• Feed the Passion You Hunger for (caregiving.com)
• Report Released Today Says You’re in Good Company (caregiving.com)

The report, produced by the MetLife Mature Market Institute® with the National Alliance for Caregiving in conjunction with the University of Pittsburgh Institute of Aging, also found that younger caregivers (ages 18 to 39) cost their employers 11% more for health care than non-caregivers, while male caregivers cost an additional 18%. It also found that eldercare may be closely associated with high-risk behaviors like smoking and alcohol consumption. Exacerbating the potential impact to employers is the possibility that these medical conditions may also lead to disability-related absences.

The MetLife report was drawn from an analysis of 17,000 employees of a major multinational U.S. corporation who completed health risk assessment questionnaires (HRA). Twelve percent were caregivers for an older person.

Additional study findings:

• Among particular employee segments, some are particularly at risk. Younger caregivers (18 to 39 years old) demonstrated significantly higher rates of cholesterol, hypertension, COPD, depression, kidney disease, and heart disease in comparison to non-caregivers of the same age.
• Employed caregivers find it more difficult than non-caregivers to take care of their own health or participate in preventive health screenings. For example, women caregivers were less likely to report annual mammograms than non-caregivers.
• Employees with eldercare responsibilities were more likely to report missed days of work. Overall, 10% of caregivers missed at least one day of work over the past two weeks because of health issues compared to 9% of non-caregivers. Differences were mostly driven by the much higher absenteeism among younger caregiving employees, age 18 to 39.

To meet the health care needs of caregivers while reducing the associated costs, employers should consider integrating their wellness and eldercare programs. In addition to practices like flexible hours, paid time off (PTO) and telecommuting, the report contains suggestions to connect their employees who are caregivers with wellness programs that will reduce their stress, positively impact their health and provide needed support. These include stress-reduction seminars expanded to include on-site yoga and exercise classes, relaxation techniques and massage therapy, decision-support systems providing information about available services, financial incentives to encourage participation in preventive benefits offered by employers (like premium reductions for those who obtain annual physicals, mammograms, Pap tests, smoking cessation classes, and exercise), expanded on-site medical screenings, and free legal and financial advice, especially pertaining to Medicare, Medicaid, and insurance.

The MetLife Study of Working Caregivers and Employer Health Care Costs can be downloaded from www.maturemarketinstitute.com; look for ”New from the MMI.”

On Your Caregiving Journey
Sandra Timmermann, director of the MetLife Mature Market Institute, joined us for a discussion of the study and to share tips for working family caregivers. You can listen to our interview the player below.