回顧文獻顯示在照顧精神病患時，照顧者由於必須持續長時間的費心，使得其在情緒、生理、社會及財務方面都出現了相當嚴重的問題，過去在社區醫療體系中採取了一些措施，希望能進一步分擔家屬在照顧病患的重擔，如支持團體、日間照護、喘息照護等，其中『支持團體』則突顯及拓展了醫療人員在此領域上之功能並能提供照顧者與社會之連結而重獲身心之平衡。在探討支持團體的研究中也顯示支持團體在處理照顧者的生理、情緒、社會與財務等方面的問題有其成效，此篇文章則在撰述支持團體之主要概念，包括：支持團體之類型、支持團體之功能、結構與組成；另外，也評值了最近幾年發表在期刊雜誌上有關精神病患家屬支持團體之相關研究，對其研究的優勢發展與限制皆加以闡釋分析，對這些議題之探討則有助於在『照顧領域』與『支持團體』範疇的深入之理解與知識本體之精進。

Research has documented that providing care to the mental illness patient can make the caregivers themselves more vulnerable to physical, emotional, social and financial problems. A number of different services designed to support caregivers of patients with mental illness have emerged in the last decade, such as support groups, respite care, and adult day care. A support group can offer compensatory social ties and a safe environment for caregivers to regain equilibrium. Support groups have proved to be a successful intervention and strategy to address the problems of caregivers. The article addresses the major aspects of support groups (types of support group, function of support group and its structure and membership) and also examines related methodological issues and research designs characterized in recent literature. This paper also evaluates recent studies on conducting support groups for caregivers of mental illness patients. Methodological barriers that have limited the research potential in this field are addressed in this article. This paper also discusses the progress made in caregiver's support group research. Attention to issues related to caregivers' support groups provided us with "know-how" in conducting a support group and enabled us to advance knowledge and research about caregiving and support groups.