Caregiving Activities and Activity-Limiting Pain Among African American Caregivers

African American caregivers disproportionately engage in high-intensity caregiving. Pain experiences of African Americans may interfere with caregiving and overall health, but little is known about the associations of caregiving activities and activity-limiting pain among African Americans.

We aimed to 1) examine risk factors for activity-limiting pain among African American caregivers and 2) analyze the relationships between caregiving intensity, patient care needs and activity-limiting pain.

In a cross-sectional analysis, using nationally representative data from the National Study of Caregiving and linked National Health and Aging Trends Study, we analyzed caregiver and care recipient factors associated with activity-limiting pain among African American caregivers. We examined the relationship between caregiving intensity, patient care needs and activity-limiting pain using multivariable logistic regression. Sampling weights were applied to make nationally representative estimates.

Our sample (N = 1673) included mostly female (63.5%) African American caregivers, with a mean age of 55.8 ± 21.5 years. Nearly half experience pain and 11% report activity-limiting pain. In our fully adjusted, multivariable model, those with higher intensity caregiving (i.e., longer duration of caregiving) [aOR: 2.09, CI: 1.29-3.39] and higher patient care needs (i.e., supporting care recipients requiring assistance for more activities of daily living (ADLs)) [aOR: 1.15, CI: 1.02-1.29] had higher odds of activity-limiting pain compared to those with lower intensity caregiving and lower care needs.

These findings underscore the importance of the intersection of race, caregiving, and pain. Future work should explore how African American caregivers cope with pain and how best to support them.