Caregiver-Centered Care Health Workforce Education is a Program of Applied Research & Innovation in Health Services Delivery in Family Caregiving, Department of Family Medicine, University of Alberta

Caregiver-Centered Care Advanced Education:

Navigating Health and Social Systems and Accessing Resources

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Learning Outcomes

1. Work collaboratively with family caregivers to access applicable supports in a timely manner.
2. Communicate with, and make referrals to other providers, in accordance with family caregivers' preferences.
3. Work with family caregivers to overcome barriers to access services, including identifying and addressing systemic issues.

Navigating Health and Social Systems and Accessing Resources

As family caregivers, we’re struggling on our own to find out which path to go down. It feels like we’re on an island. Healthcare providers can help us get off the island.

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I had a physician ask me, “Have you heard everything? Do you have everything you need? Is there anything more that you need?”

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That compassionate reach out gave me an empathic trail to find resources and support and get access to them.

�- Linda Powell, Family Caregiver

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Navigation: How can you help?

Family caregivers want to know:

• What services are available for them?
• When do they need those services?
• Where can they access those services?
• How do they access those services?

�Having some basic knowledge (e.g. referral/eligibility criteria) for social care systems and a higher level of knowledge about healthcare supports is needed. �

Cultivating a bank of various local resources in the context of your practice is essential

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The Caregiver is the Driver: The Provider is the Navigator.

Supporting Family Caregivers in their Journey

Key Principles of Effective �Caregiver-Centered Care Navigation

1. Connection to services is based upon family caregivers’ priority needs and quality of life concerns.�
2. Services and resources are tailored to family caregivers’ values, preferences, and circumstances.�
3. Prepares family caregivers for the journey while honouring and respecting people’s cultures and relationships. �
4. Strives to optimize quality of life for both family caregivers and those they care for.

Supporting Navigation: Common Constraints

Parmar, J.; Hafeez, S.; L’Heureux, T.; Charles, L.; Tite, J.; Tian, P.G.J.; Anderson, S. Family physicians’ preferences for education to support family caregivers: a sequential mixed methods study. BMC Primary Care 2024, 25, 80, doi:10.1186/s12875-024-02320-9.

There are often times where there isn't a resource in existence, or if there was, I’m not sure of it, especially for some of the low-profile conditions.

It’s an over whelming and onerous task to imagine that I'm going to try and keep up with all the various support agencies and whatnot.

The biggest challenge is knowing what's available... [if] you don't know and really this isn't medical, this is social stuff and there's not really a social worker available that you can chat to. It becomes very difficult to know.

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