Palliative medicine
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Palliative medicine · Jul 2013
Informal hospice caregiver pain management concerns: a qualitative study.
Informal, unpaid, family caregivers provide much hospice care in the United States. These caregivers suffer physically, psychologically, emotionally, and socially from the burden of caring. The most often identified area of caregiver burden is the management of end-of-life pain. However, little empirical evidence exists of effective interventions to help caregivers manage end-of-life pain, and issues surrounding caregiver pain management remain vague and undefined. Understanding these concerns will inform the design of effective caregiver interventions. ⋯ This analysis clearly articulated and classified caregiver issues surrounding pain management. Future hospice research may benefit from the use of this analysis and framework in the development of tools to alleviate this major cause of caregiver burden.
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Palliative medicine · Jul 2013
Bereaved relatives' perspectives of the patient's oral intake towards the end of life: a qualitative study.
Patients approaching death often have a decreasing oral intake, which can be distressing for relatives. Little is known about the relatives' experiences with and perceptions of oral intake at the end of life. ⋯ This study revealed the complexity of meaning relatives' experiences with dying patients' decreasing oral intake. Their perceptions and concerns were related to their awareness of the imminent death. These findings can guide staff involved in care delivery to better support relatives.
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Palliative medicine · Jul 2013
Family caregiver learning--how family caregivers learn to provide care at the end of life: a qualitative secondary analysis of four datasets.
Family caregivers are assuming growing responsibilities in providing care to dying family members. Supporting them is fundamental to ensure quality end-of-life care and to buffer potentially negative outcomes, although family caregivers frequently acknowledge a deficiency of information, knowledge, and skills necessary to assume the tasks involved in this care. ⋯ Findings inform areas for future research to identify effective, individualized programs and interventions to support positive learning experiences for family caregivers of dying people.
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Palliative medicine · Jul 2013
Living with breathlessness: a survey of caregivers of breathless patients with lung cancer or heart failure.
Breathlessness is a common, distressing symptom in patients with advanced disease. With increasing focus on home death for patients, carers are expected to support breathless people at home. Little is known about how carers experience breathlessness and the differences in caring for someone with breathlessness and malignant or non-malignant disease. ⋯ Those who care for breathless patients report high levels of unmet needs and burden, equally severe for heart failure and lung cancer caregivers. Caregivers of patients with more severe breathlessness report fewer positive caring experiences and should be targeted by services with increased support in managing this symptom.