摘要：Especially when one member of a family illness will affect the other members of the same family. Sometimes a member may feel a greater burden of responsibility. The purpose of this mixed methods study is to examine the burden that the family members experienced by caring for individuals with stoke at Rayong hospital, Thailand (from March 1, 2015 to April, 2015). 40 relatives of stroke patients were recruited using systematic random sampling. The participants completed the Zarit Burden Questionnaire and ten of them were interviewed with semi structural interviews for qualitative study and analyzed using analytic induction. Quantitative analyses showed that stroke has a moderate burden moderate) X = 30.3, SD = 13.7 (for the family. Participant’s gender, age, income, marital status, degree of relationship between the caregivers and the stroke patients, and degree of patient’s disability produced no significant result. There were two significant effects of the hours of care) F (2, 37) = 4.173, p = .023) and participant’s level of education) F (2, 37) = 5.424, p=.009) on family burden. In-depth interviews with ten caregivers of patients with stroke revealed 3 main dimensions of family burden, including personal strain, personal or inner conflict and guilt. The results suggested that Zarit Burden Interview were appropriated for measured family burden of stroke.
