Caring ability, burden, stress and coping of family caregivers of people in cancer treatment

Abstract

Objective: To analyze the association between the caring ability and the burden, stress and coping of family caregivers of people in cancer treatment. Method: A cross-sectional study with 132 family caregivers. The following instruments were applied: a characterization instrument, the Caring Ability Inventory, the Zarit Burden Interview, the Perceived Stress Scale, and the Brief COPE. The Spearman Correlation was used with significance ≤5%. Results: There were significant and positive correlations between total caring ability and: burden - interpersonal relationship (p=0.03); stress (p=0.02) and maladaptive coping (p=0.00); and inversely proportional correlations with problem-focused coping (p=0.03). The courage had inversely proportional correlation with: self-efficacy (p=0.03), interpersonal relationship (p=0.00), stress (p=0.04) and maladaptive coping (p=0.00). The knowledge had significant and positive correlation with problem-focused coping (p=0.00), adaptive coping (p=0.01), and inverse correlation with stress (p=0.02). Conclusion: The level of caring ability correlates with levels of stress and burden, and with the type of coping strategy used by family caregivers.

Quality of Life of Informal Caregivers of Cervical Cancer Patients: Analysis of Anxiety and Spirituality

“…Other studies also reinforce that most informal caregivers in Brazil are married and have about nine years of education and a family income of 2 Brazilian minimum wages. Informal caregivers have jobs and patient care is considered a "second shift", contrary to the findings in our study which shows that 63.9% were unemployed and 59.7% spent more than 18 hours on patient care (Coppetti et al, 2019;Gayoso et al, 2018).…”

“…A recent study reports that the burden of male caregivers may be directly influenced by the advanced stage of the patient's disease, which is characterized by a decrease in a patient's functionality and a greater demand for caregiving, in addition to the uncertainty of the duration of such caregiving (Govina et al2019). However, the literature reinforces that the association between gender and burden cannot be analyzed in isolation, since the evaluation of burden is subjective and has to be analyzed with other underlying factors, such as financial and emotional issues, workload and hours dedicated to care (Coppetti et al, 2019;Swinkels et al, 2019). The resuts need to be replicated in future studies that include a similar number of male and female caregivers, and shoud therefore, be interpreted caustiously.…”

“…Caring for cancer patients may cause emotional discomfort requiring caregivers to resort to emotional and behavioral coping mechanisms (Botelho & Pereira, 2015). The literature describes that the way the caregiver adapts to the adversities imposed by the caregiving will depend on the power to react to the difficulties during the course of the illness and on the effectiveness of one's coping strategies (Aydogan et al, 2016;Coppetti et al, 2019). Among caregivers of cancer patients, coping has been shown to moderate the relationship between psychological morbidity and QOL, i.e., caregivers with better coping strategies showed lesser symptoms of anxiety and better QOL (Coppetti et al, 2019;Teskereci & Kulakaç, 2018).…”

Stress, Overload and Quality of Life in Caregivers of Children With/Without Orofacial Cleft and Dysphagia

“…In fact, frequent visits to hospitals increased the family's stress and anxiety 21 . Thus, the training of caregivers aiming at their preparation for hospital discharge, that is, for care continuity at the residence, must be established as a priority, since the level of care ability, among other factors, influences the overload and stress levels 22 .…”

Development and psychometric testing of the Spanish version of the Caregiver Preparedness Scale

“…Regarding the frequency analysis, it should be noted that one out of every four of the caregivers acknowledged not being prepared at all or not very well prepared to face the stress involved in caregiving and only 7% stated that they were highly prepared to manage it. Caregiver stress is related to caregiving capacity, which decreases when stress increases (Coppetti et al, 2019). We can affirm that many caregivers feel stress from caregiving, especially those who dedicate many hours per day to caregiving or who have done it for many years (based on our own unpublished research results).…”