Survey of Family Caregiver Needs of Patients with Bipolar Disorder

Introduction & Nowadays، families of patients with bipolar disorders are actively participating in the care of their relatives. Successful management of bipolar disorder in the community relies significantly on family caregivers. The needs and experiences of such caregivers have been little studied with respect to bipolar disorder. The aim of the study was to identify the family caregivers’ needs of patients with bipolar disorder. This study is a qualitative research of phenomenological methodology in which the caregivers taking care family members with bipolar disorder in Farshchian psychiatric hospital in Hamadan were selected through purposive sampling. In order to reach data saturation،we interviewd 12 persons. Data were gathered through in-semi unstructured interviews and analyzed by «Colaizzi” method. Five groups were identified in this study analysis: illness management، counselling، economical needs، persistent care، and social attention & perception. Identification of the needs of caregivers taking care of family members with bipolar disorder let the health providers choose the specific caring interventions that are effective in sustaining family care giving cycle.