Il disagio sanitario delle famiglie

In this paper we analyze the magnitude and the risk factors of health uneasiness of the Veneto families. Uneasiness is analyzed as a dichotomous (severe vs. mild or nil uneasiness) and a 4-grade ordinal variable (nil, affordable by family, services’ help requested, and hopeless uneasiness). We show that disability is the most important cause of uneasiness, but that very often there are caregivers in the family or among relatives, who can cope with the problem. Families with greater economic and cultural resources are advantaged. There are very difficult conditions too, when families are not able to manage the problem: the worst is due to the presence of elderly with Alzheimer disease. Half of these families have hopeless uneasiness, they need health and social services, that are missing. Another severe condition is present in families with disabled offspring, but in this case the use of health and social services is widespread and reduces the severity of uneasiness.