Addressing Differential Impacts of Covid-19 in NYS: Positive Impacts on Health Disparities for Kinship Caregivers Using Technologies New to Them: Lessons Learned about Virtual Peer Support Services Compelled by COVID-19

Abstract

Kinship caregivers are non-parent relatives, commonly grandparents, or anyone with a positive relationship to the family who cares for a child full time in the absence of a biological parent. Many kinship caregivers identify as Black or Hispanic, members of minority groups long documented to suffer health disparities, including challenges in behavioral health. In 2018 New York State Kinship Navigator implemented the Kinship Navigator System of Care Project (see www.nysnavigator.org). As part of the project evaluation, University at Albany researchers survey participants and track peer support group services delivered by five agencies. In March 2020 the COVID-19 pandemic forced agency staff to transition in-person peer support meetings to online ones, forcing already burdened kinship caregivers to learn how to connect with their peers through digital technologies new to them. This exploratory study examined the relationship between a pandemic-mandated technological change in family service delivery and how this change shaped some kinship caregivers’ access to and benefits received from peer support meetings. Researchers conducted ten focus groups and two individual interviews between November 2020 and March 2021 with 46 individuals. Themes surfaced, among others, included: (1) transitioning to virtual meetings presented insurmountable hurdles for some, and (2) transitioning to virtual meetings was relatively easy. The findings suggest that this pandemic-induced technological change in kinship caregiver peer support will likely have a transformative effect post-pandemic on the delivery of family support services, perhaps in a hybrid in-person/virtual form. Study limitations and future directions for research are discussed.