Presentation (CTI)

OBJECTIVES: National surveys in Europe, the UK, Australia and the US indicate that 10-15% of the total population provide informal care. Informal carers experience poorer physical and mental health than non-carers. Studies from the UK (Thomas et al., 2015), France (Pozet et al., 2025) and Australia (Sokolova et al., 2024) have found that caregiving is associated with poorer health-related quality of life (HRQoL). We aimed to describe HRQoL of informal carers using the Health Survey for England, a nationally representative population survey.
METHODS: The 2005 and 2006 waves of the Health Survey for England included EQ-5D-3L and collected information on informal caregiving from 21,551 respondents. EQ-5D index scores were stratified by caregiving and other key socio-economic characteristics. Linear regression was used to assess the impact of caregiving on EQ-5D index scores.
RESULTS: Carers younger than 50 years old had lower EQ-5D index scores than non-carers. Married and/or cohabiting carers reported lower EQ-5D index scores. Similarly, carers with average or higher incomes had lower EQ-5D index scores than non-carers. In contrast, among respondents with a limiting illness, carers reported higher HRQoL than non-carers. Carers engaged in manual work had similar EQ‑5D scores to non-carers. Linear regression analysis including a full set of interactions for informal caregiving and the other socio-economic variables demonstrated that married carers had significantly lower EQ-5D index scores (-0.079, p=0.018). Conversely, carers in the highest income quintile had significantly higher EQ-5D index scores (0.050, p=0.003).
CONCLUSIONS: The HRQoL of married carers was significantly negatively associated with caregiving status, whereas higher income appeared to have a protective effect. These findings provide evidence for informal carer effects in economic evaluations adopting a societal perspective.