Study In 10 years one million cases of care

Study: In ten years' time, twice as many people will care for their relatives

04/12/2012

About ten million people in Germany have at least one patient in the family. According to a scientific evaluation, this group of patients will increase drastically in the coming years. For caring relatives, those affected and the social system, this development will be a drastic test of stress. The reason for this is demographic change, which is causing the Germans to get older and older. This also increases the number of nursing cases.

Number of people in need of care will double
„In ten years, the number of people in Germany who have at least one person to care for in the family will more than double.“ This is the result of a recent study by the Allensbach Institute on behalf of the insurance company „R + V insurance“. Currently, more than ten million affected family members live in Germany. According to the projections of the insurance company, the number in 2022 will have risen to around 27 million in Germany.

Especially women care for relatives
About two-thirds of family members look after their relatives in need of care themselves. Especially women are already affected to an above-average extent. According to the study, they are among the most caregivers as well as more often than men to the nursing cases. Typically, the „Caregivers“ About 61 years old, married, not working and has two children. Most volunteer nurses have been supporting their needy family members for over three years. Only 42 percent of nursing women are employed, but in most cases only part-time.

More than half of the women provide at least three hours a day to a patient. 37 percent of working women also spend at least three hours on their relatives. About two-thirds of the women surveyed said they were suffering from mental illness or caring for them mentally and physically „heavily loaded“. Forty percent of women said caregiving also affected their relationship with their husband.

Those affected expect more help from state social security systems
Most of those affected demand more political commitment. For example, 60 percent said they wanted better reconciliation of care and work. In a similar survey study, only 41 percent of respondents had expressed this wish. The absolute majority (78 percent) want more financial and practical support from the social welfare systems of the state. 55 percent also demanded the same help from their employer.

Most of the interviewed participants stated that in the near future they expect a case of care in their relatives, they want to resort to savings for this task. The savings deposits of those in need of care will be accessed by 61 per cent and the own savings account by about 34 per cent. About 25 percent want to ask in the near relatives for funds. A good 32 percent assume that they will have to limit their finances in the future.

Only a few have completed a private long-term care insurance
In contrast, the least spend money for a private care insurance. Only 23 percent of respondents said they had completed private supplementary insurance. The authors of the study, however, assume that this is often the case „only a statutory long-term care insurance is“. This assumption derives from the fact that only about two percent of Germans have such private nursing care insurance. This was recently determined by the Association of Private Health Insurance (PKV) in an evaluation.

The R + V board member Tillmann Lukosch warned in the face of the study results before one „ticking time bomb“. The topic of care „According to Lukassch, people in Germany are getting older, so that the proportion of those in need of care is also steadily increasing According to Allensbach boss Renate Köcher, care is becoming one with the demographic development very big challenge for the social security system in Germany. (sb)

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New models of long-term care insurance in demand
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Rösler plans private supplementary care insurance
Contribution assessment limit is lowered
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Picture: Rainer Sturm