ETHNOGERIATRICS AND SPECIAL POPULATIONS Differences in Amount of Informal Care Received by Non-Hispanic Whites and Latinos in a Nationally Representative Sample of Older Americans Carlos O. Weiss, MD, à Hector M. Gonza ´ lez, PhD, w Mohammed U. Kabeto, MS, z and Kenneth M. Langa, MD, PhD z §k The objective of this study was to evaluate informal (un- paid) care and its broad determinants for Latinos in a na- tionally representative sample. A cross-sectional analysis of the 1993 Asset and Health Dynamics Study, a national probability sample of 7,443 older adults aged 70 and older, was performed to determine the independent effect of La- tino ethnicity on the receipt of informal care by disabled older individuals. Self-reported race/ethnicity was used to predict the mean daily hours of informal care received for activity of daily living (ADL) or instrumental activity of daily living (IADL) assistance after adjustment for predis- posing, need, and enabling variables. There was a signifi- cant association between informal home care and ethnic group, with 44.3% of Latinos receiving informal care, compared with 33.9% of African Americans and 24.6% of non-Hispanic whites (Po.001). After adjustment, Latinos received 11.0 weekly hours of informal care, compared with 7.5 hours for non-Hispanic whites and 6.3 hours for African Americans (Po.001). The results from this nation- ally representative sample indicate that Latinos receive sig- nificantly more hours of informal care on average than African Americans or non-Hispanic whites for ADL and IADL disability. Clinicians should be alert to the significant amount of informal care and possible associated strain in caregivers of older Latinos. J Am Geriatr Soc 53: 146–151, 2005. Key words: social support; Latino; disabled persons B y 2030, the U.S. population of Latinos is projected to increase to 19.4% and account for a significant portion of the coming boom in the older population in this country. 1 Older Latinos have a high burden of some diseases and poor self-perceived health. 2 They are also likely to be at higher risk for poor health outcomes due to higher rates of poverty and lower rates of health insurance coverage than non-His- panic Whites (NHWs). 3 For these reasons, understanding the use of informal sources of health care in this growing population is important to clinicians, healthcare managers, and policy makers, yet currently little is known about pat- terns in informal care (unpaid help from family and friends) of disabled older Latinos in the United States at the pop- ulation level. Although some reports have suggested that Latinos re- ceive more informal care (unpaid help from family and friends) than NHWs, the data supporting the premise that Latinos are more traditional in their family structure and provide more care as a group are limited. 4 An analysis of the Channeling Study using 1982 to 1984 data found that Lat- inos and African Americans (AAs) used more informal care than NHWs, 5 but the fact that the majority of Latinos it included were Cuban Americans living in Florida limited that study. More is known about patterns of utilization of formal (paid) healthcare. For example, patterns of formal care utilization found in the Channeling Study indicate that Latinos used less formal care than NHWs, but they used more organized community-based services such as congre- gate meals and counseling. 6 In general, the limited literature on informal care of Latinos, quantitative and qualitative, has used nonrepresentative samples. 7–12 Given the growing number of elderly Latinos and the current lack of nationally representative information about The National Institute on Aging provided funding for the Asset and Health Dynamics Study (U01 AG09740), data from which were used in this analysis. An abstract of this work was presented as a poster at the American Geriatrics Society Annual Scientific Meeting in Baltimore, Maryland, May 14–18, 2003. Dr. Weiss received support from a National Institute on Aging Training Grant (T32AG00247) during the completion of this work. Dr. Gonza ´ lez was supported by a Career Development Award from the National Institute on Mental Health (K08 MH67726). Dr. Langa was supported by a Career Development Award from the National Institute on Aging (K08 AG19180), a New Investigator Research Grant from the Alzheimer’s Association and a Paul Beeson Physician Faculty Scholar in Aging Research Award. Address correspondence to Carlos O. Weiss, MD, Center on Aging and Health, 2024 E. Monument St., Suite 2–700, Baltimore, MD 21205. E-mail: cweiss9@jhmi.edu From the à Center on Aging and Health, Bloomberg School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, Maryland; w Department of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, z Division of General Medicine, School of Medicine, and § Institute for Social Research, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan; and k Center for Practice Management and Outcomes Research, Department of Veterans Affairs, Ann Arbor, Michigan. JAGS 53:146–151, 2005 r 2005 by the American Geriatrics Society 0002-8614/04/$15.00