Background Digital support services solutions may provide informal caregivers with remote access to information and training about care and caring-related issues. However, there is limited specific data on how factors such as demographics, socioeconomic resources and the caregiving context may influence caregivers’ use of the Internet to access digital support services.

Objective The aim of this study is to identify associations between informal caregiver’s characteristics and the use of the Internet to access digital support services in two countries: Italy and Sweden.

Methods A sample of 663 respondents participated in the survey by completing the online questionnaire. Respondents were recruited by the Italian National Institute of Health and Science on Ageing and the Swedish Family Care Competence Centre. Descriptive statistics and logistic regression analyses were performed to assess predictors of caregivers’ frequent use of the Internet to access digital support services. The sets of the independent variables included: caregiver’s demographics; caregiver’s socioeconomic resources; and caregiving context.

Results Bivariate analysis showed that the frequent use of the Internet to access digital support services among Italian caregivers in the study was associated with caregiver’s age, health status, educational attainment, total household income, care recipient relationship to the caregiver, gender of care recipient, age of care recipient, hours per week spent caring and the level of dependency of the care recipient. Educational attainment (odds ratio [OR] 3.649, 95%CI: 1.424–9.350, p=0.007), hours per week spent caring (odds ratio [OR] 2.928, 95%CI: 1.481–5.791, p=0.002), total household income (odds ratio [OR] 0.378, 95%CI: 0.149–0.957, p=0.040), care recipient relationship to the caregiver (odds ratio [OR] 2.895, 95%CI: 1.037–8.083, p=0.042) and gender of care recipient (odds ratio [OR] 0.575, 95%CI: 0.356–0.928, p=0.023) remained significant predictors in the multivariate analysis for the Italian caregivers group. The frequent use of the Internet to access digital support services among Swedish caregivers in the study was associated with caregiver’s age, care recipient relationship to the caregiver, age of care recipient and hours per week spent caring. Hours per week spent caring (odds ratio [OR] 2.401, 95%CI: 1.105–5.218, p=0.027) and age of care recipient (odds ratio [OR] 2.237, 95%CI: 1.150–4.352, p=0.018) remained significant predictors in the multivariate analysis for the Swedish caregivers group.

Conclusions Digital support services could be important tools to empower and support informal caregivers. On the other hand, it also needs to be recognized that informal caregivers are a diverse population, living in a wide range of personal and social circumstances. When it comes to policy and practice in relation to caregivers, similarly to other broad vulnerable groups, there is no ‘one size fits all’ approach, and it is therefore important to consider the specific characteristics and needs of both caregivers and care recipients.