Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada.
Yuma Regional Medical Center, Yuma, Arizona, USA.
Health Soc Care Community. 2022 Nov;30(6):2311-2319. doi: 10.1111/hsc.13781. Epub 2022 Mar 14.
Every year tens of thousands of older Canadians travel to the southern United States (US) to live there seasonally during the winter months to enjoy a warmer climate-a practice known as international retirement migration. Several factors facilitate participation in this transnational mobility, including having the financial resources needed to live abroad. For those managing chronic or acute health conditions, traveling with a caregiver (typically a spouse) is another important facilitator. In this qualitative analysis, we explore the transnational systems of support that Canadian international retirement migrant spousal caregivers draw upon to enable them to provide care while in the US. We report on the findings of ten semi-structured dyad interviews (n = 20 participants) conducted with Canadian international retirement migrants living seasonally in Yuma, Arizona. The dyads consisted of spouses, one of whom had defined care needs and the other of whom provided informal care. Through thematic analysis of these interviews, we identified three types of transnational support systems that spousal caregivers draw on: relational, community-based and practical. While aspects of these support systems have been documented in other informal care-giving studies, this analysis demonstrates their copresence in the transnational care-giving context associated with international retirement migration. Overall, this analysis highlights the benefits of close social relations enjoyed by international retirement migrants providing informal care to mitigate the lack of access to their established support networks at home.
每年都有数以万计的加拿大老年人前往美国南部，在冬季季节性居住，享受更温暖的气候——这种做法被称为国际退休移民。有几个因素促进了这种跨国流动的参与，包括拥有在国外生活所需的经济资源。对于那些患有慢性或急性健康状况的人来说，与护理人员（通常是配偶）一起旅行是另一个重要的促进因素。在这项定性分析中，我们探讨了加拿大国际退休移民配偶护理人员所依赖的跨国支持系统，以使他们能够在美国提供护理。我们报告了对居住在亚利桑那州尤马季节性的 20 名加拿大国际退休移民进行的十对半结构化访谈（n=20 名参与者）的研究结果。这些二人组由配偶组成，其中一人有明确的护理需求，另一人提供非正式护理。通过对这些访谈的主题分析，我们确定了配偶护理人员依赖的三种跨国支持系统：关系、社区和实际。虽然这些支持系统的某些方面在其他非正规护理研究中已有记录，但本分析表明，这些支持系统在与国际退休移民相关的跨国护理背景下同时存在。总体而言，这项分析强调了提供非正式护理的加拿大国际退休移民所享有的密切社会关系的好处，以缓解他们在家中无法获得既定支持网络的问题。
