Support Needs Of Family Caregivers Of Cancer Patients In Home-based Hospice Care

OBJECTIVE1.To introduce the Carer Support Needs Assessment Tool(CSNAT),make cross-cultural revisions,and verify its reliability and validity in family caregivers of cancer patients in home-based hospice care.To evaluate the feasibility of the Chinese version of the CSNAT in China.2.To investigate the status of support needs of family caregivers and analyze the influencing factors.To investigate the status of family caregiver’s care burden and quality of life,and explore the relationship among them.3.To explore the barriers and facilitators to the implementation of the needs assessment in the hospice care institution,to analyze the feasibility and strategies of needs assessment implementation.METHODS1.Cross-cultural adaption of the CSNAT:Authorized by the original author’s email and signed an agreement,through the steps of forward translation,back translation,expert review and a pilot study.A Chinese version of caregiver support needs assessment tool was formed.Additionally,applying Chinese version of CSNAT to caregivers of end-of-life cancer patients at home in a hospice care institution in Guangdong Province.Evaluating its reliability and validity,and exploring the feasibility of its application in home-based hospice care practice.2.Cross-sectional survey:A cross-sectional survey was conducted on 225 caregivers of patients with end-of-life cancer patients at home who met the inclusion criteria using a convenient sampling method.3.Semi-structured interview:Ten caregivers and six workers in hospice care institution were selected for face-to-face interviews using the purpose sampling method.Analysis of text data based on the Green model using content analysis.RESULTS1.The Chinese version of CSNAT includes 14 items,the content validity index is 0.986,the surface validity is good,the convergent validity is good,and the internal consistency Cronbach’s a coefficient is 0.899,which is feasible in the application of hospice care.2.The total score for the support needs of family caregivers of end-of-life cancer patients is 14.67±0.862,at intermediate levels.The top three rates are:"When caring for a loved one,you can foresee the possible changes in the future,""Handling the symptoms of a loved one,including giving him medication," and"Who to contact to discuss your concerns about your loved ones(including A variety of issues that need help,night care matters)." Multiple linear regression analysis showed that the factors affecting the caregiver’s support needs included monthly family income,patient’s pain level,whether the patient had difficulty in swallowing and breathing.3.The facilitators of needs assessment include a lot of needs of caregivers.Needs assessment can provide support for caregivers.Barriers include caregivers not paying attention to their own value,and the current institutional resources are insufficient to support the implementation conditions of needs assessment.CONCLUSION1.The Chinese version of CSNAT has good validity and reliability,which can be used to assess the support needs of family caregivers of cancer patients in home-based hospice care with few items.It can be used to assess the support needs of family caregivers in the practice of home-based hospice care in China.2.The support needs of family caregivers are relatively high,which are affected by a variety of risk factors.More attention is needed in the future.3.Needs assessment has feasibility to be implemented in the hospice care institutions,but it needs support from the national policies,government and social resources.