Changes in the health care system have resulted in a shift of cancer care from the in-patient arena to ambulatory and home settings. This shift has likewise translated into increased family involvement in the day-to-day care of the person with cancer. Cancer patients have multifaceted needs, including disease and treatment monitoring, symptom management, medication administration, emotional support, assistance with personal care, and assistance with instrument care. Family caregivers may be ill prepared to assume these tasks, requiring information on the disease and treatment, as well as instruction in technical and care skills.Moreover, caregiving must be balanced against already established roles and role responsibilities. In addition, family caregivers have their own emotional responses to the patients' diagnosis and prognosis, and may require coaching and emotional support themselves.The health care system can facilitate positive outcomes by embracing the family caregiver as a partner in the health care team, providing instruction and guidance to the caregiver as he/she assumes this role, and evaluating the home care situation. Research to date has only scratched the surface of testing interventions that meet the needs of the cancer caregiver.A research agenda is proposed to more fully elucidate the cancer caregiver's experience throughout the illness and treatment trajectory, and identify the means to effecting positive outcomes for the person with cancer, their family caregiver, and the health care system. (CA Cancer J Clin 2001;51:213-231 Family members may need to devote more time to caring for their patient and often react to the strains that patient care introduces into their daily lives. Most pressing, however, will be concerns about the patient: How to maintain comfort, how to manage equipment, and when to report changes in their patient's status. Moreover, family members may be concerned about their abilities to balance the demands of care with other responsibilities and wonder what the immediate future will be like for them and their patient with advanced cancer.It is against this backdrop that the support needed by family caregivers for persons with advanced cancer should be viewed. The role of family caregivers has shifted from one of custodial care to a complex, multifaceted role that includes symptom management, monitoring for changes in hallmark symptoms, equipment care (e.g., infusion pumps or IVs), patient transport and advocacy, and management of activities/responsibilities the patient has foregone because of illness. Due to advances in treatment, the cancer care trajectory has increased from days and weeks to months and years. Few Strategies for Family CareTo date, the oncology care system has not fully incorporated "family care" for patients at home. There are few documented, effective strategies to guide family members caring for patients with advanced cancer. The absence of strategies persists despite the fact that burden and distress on family caregivers has been studied since...

Using data obtained from an inception cohort of 841 patients aged 65 or older newly diagnosed with breast, colon, lung, or prostate cancer, and observed at 6-8, 12-16, 24-30, and 52 weeks, three questions related to patients' experiences with pain and fatigue were posed. First, how do numbers of patients reporting neither pain nor fatigue, either symptom, or both change during the observation year? Second, did number of comorbid conditions, site and stage of cancer, treatment modalities, symptom management medication, and time affect the presence of these two symptoms? Third, do pain and fatigue predict the numbers of co-occurring other symptoms? Findings indicate that during the year patients improved with respect to their reports of pain and/or fatigue. Stage, more comorbidity, and lung cancer were related to both pain and fatigue. Chemotherapy was related to reports of fatigue, but did not have an extended effect on fatigue.

Compared with conventional care alone, the experimental intervention was effective among patients who entered the trial with higher levels of symptom severity. Age, sex, site or stage of cancer, and supportive medications did not modify the effect of this cognitive behavioral intervention on symptom severity.

These data support the "value-added" role of nursing interventions for symptom management and improved quality of life during the course of cancer treatment.

Purpose/Objectives: To evaluate the effectiveness of a cognitive behavioral intervention in decreasing symptom severity in patients with advanced cancer undergoing chemotherapy.Design: Prospective, randomized clinical trial based on cognitive behavioral theory. Setting: Six urban cancer centers in the midwestern United States.Sample: 124 patients 21 years of age or older were recruited and randomized to receive conventional care or conventional care and an intervention. Participants were newly diagnosed with stage III, stage IV, or recurrent cancer (solid tumor or non-Hodgkin lymphoma), undergoing chemotherapy, cognitively intact, and able to read and speak English.Methods: Data were gathered via telephone interviews at baseline and 10 and 20 weeks after randomization. Nurses with experience in oncology delivered a five-contact, eight-week intervention aimed at teaching patients problem-solving techniques to affect symptom severity.

Objective Improvements in clinical pain care have not matched advances in scientific knowledge, and innovations in medical education are needed. Several streams of evidence indicate that pain education needs to address both the affective and cognitive dimensions of pain. Our aim was to design and deliver a new course in pain establishing foundation-level knowledge while comprehensively addressing the emotional development needs in this area. Setting 118 first year medical students at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. Outcome measures Performance was measured by multiple choice tests of pain knowledge, attendance, reflective pain portfolios and satisfaction measures. Results Domains of competence in pain knowledge included central and peripheral pain signaling, pharmacological management of pain with standard analgesic medications, neuromodulating agents and opioids; cancer pain, musculoskeletal pain, nociceptive, inflammatory, neuropathic, geriatric, and pediatric pain. Socio-emotional development (portfolio) work focused on increasing awareness of pain affect in self and others and enhancing the commitment to excellence in pain care. Reflections included observations on a brief pain experience (cold pressor test), the multi-dimensionality of pain, the role of empathy and compassion in medical care, the positive characteristics of pain-care role models, the complex feelings engendered by pain and addiction including frustration and disappointment, and aspirations and commitments in clinical medicine. The students completing feedback expressed high levels of interest in pain medicine as a result of the course. Discussion We conclude that a four-day pain course incorporating sessions with pain- specialists, pain medicine knowledge, and design-built elements to strengthen emotional skills is an effective educational approach.

Persistent postmastectomy pain is quite common and has been classified into several distinct types. Few studies, however, have investigated either the predictors or functional impact of multiple types of post mastectomy pain. In this investigation, 278 women, who were, on average, several years post mastectomy, completed questionnaires assessing pain, pain-related physical function, and psychosocial distress. We assessed three distinct categories of postmastectomy pain: phantom breast pain, scar pain, and other mastectomy-related pain. Each of the three types of postmastectomy pain was strongly related to one another (i.e., women reporting one type of pain were more likely to report the other types as well). In general, the more types of postmastectomy pain a woman reported, the greater the degree of disability and distress. Collectively, the presence of "other mastectomy-related pain" was a stronger unique predictor of disability and distress than were the other two categories of pain. Interestingly, demographic and surgical factors, including time since surgery, were not consistent predictors of pain or function. The findings suggest that the assessment of postmastectomy pain should include formal evaluation of multiple types of pain, with additional attention paid to the category of "other mastectomy-related pains," and that the number of types of pain reported by women after surgery may be important in predicting functional outcomes.

Elderly patients with cancer report levels of function similar to other chronic conditions. Scores on physical function varied by site of cancer; the pattern of change was similar among sites. Age, comorbidity, treatment modalities, and symptom reports each had an independent effect on loss of functioning. Untreated breast cancer patients had lower functioning, suggesting a possible treatment bias.