Admission to care: Facilitating role transition amongst family carers

• Admission to care after a period of family care-giving has been the focus of much recent research. • Rather than being seen as an end in itself, admission is part of a process. • This article concentrates on 'reaching the end' of family care-giving and the 'new beginning' of entering residential care. • A cross-national study conducted in the USA and the UK is discussed, and similarities and differences in the two cultures are highlighted. • Decisions to enter a nursing home were often taken hurriedly and with lack of information in both countries. • Issues of quality of care and emotional responses by former carers were also important in both settings.