In the past decade several studies have been carried out on the mental health of persons providing care to demented family members at home. The results give the impression that the evaluation of the symptoms of dementia by caregivers, and not the objective severity of these symptoms, correlates with psychopathology in caregivers. Interpretation of the results is difficult, because of a number of methodological problems that should be avoided in future studies. These concern: 1) the selective recruitment and poor comparability of caregivers; and 2) unreliable or invalid measurements and use of statistical analyses based on small samples. Besides, researchers must give more attention to the evaluation by caregivers of aspects of dementia and the care-situation, and to personal characteristics of caregivers.