Summaries of Must-Read Clinical Literature, Guidelines, and FDA Actions

Family Caregivers for Lung Cancer Patients

Studying the effects of planning and education

Publish date:: July 14, 2015

An interdisciplinary approach to palliative care in lung cancer resulted in statistically significant improvements in family caregivers’ (FCG) social well being and psychological distress and in less caregiver burden, according to a prospective, quasi-experimental study of 366 FCGs caring for patients diagnosed with stage I through IV nonsmall cell lung cancer. An intervention group of the FCGs received education in the physical, psychological, social, and spiritual domains, as well as plans to support their own needs. Researchers found that the intervention group:

•Had significantly better scores for social well being

•Had lower scores for psychological distress

•Experienced significantly less caregiver burden than the usual-care group

Citation: Sun V, Grant M, Koczywas M, et al. Effectiveness of an interdisciplinary palliative care intervention for family caregivers in lung cancer. [Published online ahead of print July 6, 2015]. Cancer. doi: 10.1002/cncr.29567.

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