Instrument to assess burden on caregivers of chronic mentally ill.

The family is a major source of support for the mentally ill in India. Although Indian families show tremendous resilience in caring for their ill relatives, they experience a lot of physical and emotional distress. The burden assessment schedule (BAS) aims to assess both objective and subjective burden experienced by the primary care givers of chronic mentally ill patients. Stepwise ethnographic exploration has been used in the development of this 40 item instrument. Reliability exercises have been carried out throughout the development of this schedule. Criterion validity has been established by comparing with another standardized instrument to assess burden, which has been developed in India.