Otsuka has quantified the financial impact of caregivers, calculating that people in the U.S. who look after loved ones with dementia would earn $114,000 on average if paid for the daily care they provide.
The Japanese drugmaker, which works with Lundbeck to market Rexulti in Alzheimer’s disease, has made caregivers a focal point of its communications about dementia. Late last year, Otsuka published results from a survey that found almost half of people looking after a loved one with dementia feel like they’re drowning and unprepared for the role.
For its latest project, Otsuka worked with Salary.com to understand the personal financial implications of looking after a loved one with dementia. The partners assumed people provide nine hours of care, plus two hours of on-call time, a day and looked at the average salaries for different caregiving activities.
Assessing how long caregivers spend on tasks ranging from bathing to financial management and looking at the average salaries for such work generated an estimate of how much people could receive for their unpaid activities. The U.S. average ranges from $110,000 to $120,000, depending on location. Caregivers can use an Otsuka-branded tool to calculate the estimated salary for the unpaid care they provide.
Otsuka said too little attention has been paid to the individual contributions of caregivers. Other groups have studied the societal impact of dementia caregivers, estimating they contribute $350 billion, without looking at finances on an individual level. Otsuka cited the finding that 64% of caregivers are forced to make tough financial choices to make the case for considering the individual impact.
Caregivers have been a focus for Otsuka throughout the commercialization of Rexulti in the treatment of agitation associated with dementia. On an earnings call in July 2023, around two months after winning FDA approval in the indication, the company called (PDF) the condition one of the most difficult that caregivers have to deal with and pitched Rexulti as a way to help alleviate the burdens.
Otsuka has conveyed similar messages in subsequent communications, including in disease awareness and branded direct-to-consumer ads. Working with its partner Lundbeck, Otsuka ran an awareness ad in 2023 that focused on how the condition affects caregivers. The narrator said “hands [that] used to hold me ... [have] become aggressive.” The branded ad had a softer tone but kept the focus on caregivers with a message of how a child’s love for their parents survives Alzheimer’s agitation.