Alzheimer’s Society’s latest report; “Women’s unpaid dementia care and the impact on employment”, explores how unpaid dementia care disproportionately impacts women’s ability to continue paid work. The report draws on the findings via Alzheimer’s Society’s international networks, gathering evidence relating to the gender dynamic of unpaid dementia care and includes the experiences of women in the UK, providing dementia care support to family members while balancing paid work.
Globally, 71% of unpaid dementia care is provided by women - typically wives, daughters or daughters-in-law of a person with dementia - while they juggle jobs and often other care responsibilities in the home. In the UK, 63% of unpaid dementia care supporters are women. The nature of the care they provide is likely to be less flexible than that of men’s, for example women in the UK are 2.5 times more likely to provide 24-hour care to someone with dementia, making it harder to juggle their paid work.
The women Alzheimer’s Society spoke to said that the most supportive employers and managers were those who had experienced dementia in their own family and understood the long-term and progressive nature of the condition. For most of the women, they relied on using annual leave, flexible working and carer’s leave to help them juggle their dementia care commitments and the pressures of their jobs, alongside childcare and support to other family members. This report calls on governments and businesses to recognise the disproportionate impact long-term dementia care (and elder care in general) is having on women in the workplace.
“Support must be ensured through the provision of longer-term carer’s leave, flexible working and wellbeing support. If we ensure women affected by dementia, with their multiple care roles, get the right support in the workplace, we will get it right for all employees with care commitments” wrote the Alzheimer’s Society. Read the new report:“Women’s unpaid dementia care and the impact on employment”: https://www.alzheimers.org.uk/media/29161
