The collective effect of demographic, social, economic and policy trends has made family caregiving a policy issue of utmost importance in Canada. The nature of these trends is relatively well- understood.
Families are smaller, more diverse, more complex, and less stable.
Further, the gendered division of labour within families is being supplanted by 'double duty' lives, typified by simultaneous participation in paid and unpaid work for both men and women. At the same time, population aging, new patterns of chronic illness and disability, and increased survival after catastrophic illness and injury, are changing the landscape of care needs. Health and continuing care policy reform is shifting responsibility for care from formal to informal carers. Changes in the income security system are reducing the ability of care receivers and care providers to absorb the financial burden that often accompanies the need for care. Conversely, policies and programs intended to defray these costs are evolving.