The health status of rural caregivers.

The purposes of this study were to examine the relationships among stress, caregiver burden, and the health status of rural caregivers and assess whether caregiver burden and stress predict the physical health status of caregivers in the rural setting. A descriptive-correlational design was used to explore the caregiver health status of 63 informal caregivers in rural Alabama and Mississippi. The relationships among stress, burden, and health status in rural caregivers were significantly related (p .000) and significant variance in health status (p .000) was accounted for by the model variables of stress and caregiver burden. Rural caregivers experienced difficulty with transportation to the hospital and their physicians, and complained of experiencing uncomfortable physical symptoms.