| Abstract
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The present study aims at understanding and explaining the gratification process associated to «caregiving» in Lebanese family caregivers of elderly relatives at home. This population, formed in majority of women, has been the subject of many North American studies which stressed the precariousness of the health status of these caregivers. Even though caregiving of an elderly relative is often a difficult and stressing experience with negative consequences on health, it still has however, positive aspects such as gratification. The latter eases the caregiving experience. These positive aspects have not been thoroughly studied and to date no study has explored the gratification process associated with caregiving in the Lebanese context. The McGill health promotion model (Allen, 1970) is the nursing perspective retained in this qualitative study. This study has used a grounded theory inductive approach. The study took place in Lebanon, in the natural environment of family caregivers of elderly persons. A total of sixteen female caregivers of an elderly relative, daughters, wives and daughter in-laws, with an average age of 52 years, having cared for their elderly relative for six months or more have been recruited within the population of a previous Lebanese study on "the health state of family caregivers of elderly persons at home". These caregivers have been chosen according to a theoretical sampling procedure. The data collection sources included semi-directive interviews of one hour each conducted at the family caregivers home, recorded and transcribed, as well as memos. The codification of the interview verbatim followed three steps, according to the paradigmatic model of Strauss and Corbin (1998): (1) open coding, (2) axial coding, and (3) selective coding. The results lead to the proposition of an explanatory model of the gratification process related to caregiving, which seems to take two forms, either immediate gratification or deferred gratification. Gratification is a complex process involving several factors. According to the quality of the dyadic relationship caregiver-care-receiver, the caregivers are motivated by love, reciprocity, obligation/duty or personal need to take care of their relative. In order to cope with the care situation, the caregivers resort to certain internal and external resources, namely spirituality, beliefs related to caregiving and to family support. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)
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