Continuing Care performance report

Measure: Percent of Elderly Waiver (EW) and Alternative Care (AC) recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver.

Informal caregivers of older adults can receive support services such as education and training or respite care. This can include the recipient attending adult day care. The percent of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver has increased.

Why this measure is important?

Non-paid informal caregivers are family members, neighbors and friends. They provide over 90 percent of the care received by older adults in Minnesota. This care costs less than if these individuals had to use paid staff. Caregivers help with task such as chores, housekeeping, money management as well as eating, dressing and mobility.

Caregiving is hard work. It can lead to depression, stress and burden. Paid caregiver support services may help reduce these symptoms and help them continue to provide care.

What is included in the measure?

This measure has three parts:

• The number of EW and AC recipients that have an informal caregiver. This is noted on their Service Plan Summary or through claims data.

• The number of EW and AC recipients that have an informal caregiver with caregiver support listed on their Community Support Plan.

• The number of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver.

What does it mean?

A higher percent means more EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver received a paid service to directly support their caregiver. A higher percent is better because these services may help caregivers cope with stresses. These services may also help caregivers serve for longer periods of time.

How is it calculated?

The number of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver and the number of people with informal caregiver listed on their Community Support Plan divided by the total number of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver.

Percent of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver by graph

Percent of EW and AC recipients with an informal caregiver who received a paid service to directly support their caregiver by table

Data source

DHS Data Warehouse