Respite Service to Family Caregivers by the Senior Companion Program: An Urban-Rural Comparison

Abstract

The Senior Companion Program (SCP), a federally sponsored progrant, aims to enlist older volunteers to provide in-home services to the homebound elderly. A survey of 48 sample SCP projects providing family caregiver services reveals a distinctly different trajectory of urban and rural project development. In both environments, the longer a project has been in existence, the greater the number of volunteers in service. However, the number of clients served increases for urban projects, but not for rural projects. Relatedly, the unmet need for family care giver services, the number of referrals unserved by the project, is considerably greater in rural areas. These results suggest that because offactors unique to rural areas, the expansion of clientele may be more restricted in ruml settings compared to that in urban settings, thereby implying that rural-urban differences should be reflected in project planning and implementation.

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