Family caregivers on the job

More than 27 million Americans care for a seriously ill or aging relative at home. Yet neither health care professionals nor policymakers have the tools necessary to describe the tasks family caregivers perform, the first step toward developing supportive services and policies. Instead, they have relied on Activities of Daily Living (ADLs) and Instrumental Activities of Daily Living (IADLs), measures developed to assess care recipients' functional deficits, to assess the realities of the lives of their care providers. The authors of this book seek to redress the gap.--Cover. p. 4.