Congress Abstracts 2006

83

FAMILY CAREGIVERS: HEALTH-RELATED CHANGES FOLLOWING PATIENTS' CANCER DIAGNOSIS. Vlasta Aubrecht, RN, BSN, Rosanne Arlington, RN, MSN, CNS, ONC, OCN^®, and Hyacinth Gordon, RN, MSN, ONC, CRRN, University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX.

Oncology patients' family caregivers are stressed and deal with a cadre of issues that can impact their wellbeing. To support the family caregiver and help them identify some of the issues and coping/health promoting strategies, a unit-based family caregiver support group convenes weekly on a surgical oncology urology and orthopaedic nursing unit. The facilitator identified a trend as she listened to the interactions during support group and began collection of information from 100 family caregivers to determine issues related to family caregiver health and wellbeing.

The purpose of this project was to identify changes in healthcare/coping strategies used by family caregivers of patients being treated for cancer.

The facilitator began collection of information from 100 family caregivers to determine issues related to family caregiver health and wellbeing. Information solicited included signs and symptoms and any changes they experienced following the patient's cancer diagnosis; whether there had been increased use of medication/herbs - both over-the-counter and prescribed; alcohol use; use of patients' medication; keeping own healthcare appointments; use of medication as prescribed; whether they used the medication in the dosage/frequency prescribed/recommended; and whether they potentially experienced side effects of medications/herbs that they consumed.

To date information has been obtained from 49 family caregivers. Nineteen family caregivers were taking prescribed medications. Of these, 13 were also taking over-the-counter medication and did not know whether their medications were compatible. Thirty-one caregivers took over-the-counter medications for symptoms they were experiencing. Thirty-two caregivers were experiencing side effects of medications they were taking. Three caregivers began using alcohol to help them relax and 3 other caregivers began using the patient's prescription medication to self medicate for self-identified similar symptoms experienced. Caregivers reported nausea, vomiting, dizziness, diarrhea, and leg craps that they had not previously experienced as well as flaring of Rheumatoid Arthritis.

Information from this project will provide added insight to the needs of the family caregiver for the oncology nurse. Through identification of coping/health issues of family caregivers, caregiver support groups and nurses working with oncology patients and their caregivers can address specific issues during their interactions.