Finding help when you need it

Finding community resources can be key to relieving stress for caregivers, experts say. Such options can offer a lot of information packed in one place.

An 800 phone number is available that operators answer 24 hours a day. Call (800) 660-2871.

In Maine, the Portland-based Alzheimer’s Association Maine chapter has information, too.

Its Portland office is staffed from 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday. Its number is 772-0115. Its Web site is www.mainealz.org.

Employer-sponsored elder care is the kind of thing many caregivers want addressed. The overwhelming majority of those surveyed in a 2003 Johns Hopkins University survey want tax breaks for caregivers, government-sponsored long-term care insurance and better prescription drug benefits.

Group therapy, psychological counseling and support groups are among the least-favored types of help, while such options as family leave time from work, access to more information and education, and programs such as adult day care or respite are desired, according to a study by the University of Arkansas.

“The health-care system is being supported by all this volunteer labor, and maybe there are some ways to support the caregivers better,” said Peter S. Arno of Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York, author of a study titled the “Economic Value of Informal Caregiving.”

He believes the issue is beginning to get federal and state attention. “This thing has political traction,” he said.

– From Staff and Wire Reports