Carer’s perceptions of domiciliary palliative nursing care

The past five years has evidenced a major focal shift away from institutional care, with focus now being placed toward palliation of cancer patients within their homes. However, just how well the cancer patients and their carers manage this has become a major concern of community and domiciliary nursing services.

This paper will explore carers' perceptions of critical nursing behaviors associated with the care of the dying. Carers' perceptions of their levels of fatigue and caregiver burden are also explored. A Grounded Theory approach was employed. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with carers of palliative oncology patients. These interviews were carried out during the period of provision of care for their relative.

Carers also completed a questionnaire to evaluate perceived levels of caregiver burden and fatigue. A constant comparative method of data analysis was applied to 30 transcribed interviews. This data was analyzed inductively for recurrent themes in carers' descriptions of their perceptions of critical nursing behaviors. Scientific rigor was evaluated according to credibility, applicability, auditability, and confirmability.

Carers identified seven main themes: competency; facilitation to the role of caregiving; affirmation of the effectiveness as a carer; maintenance of a sense of carer control: non-intrusion of nursing staff, and 24 hour accessibility. Thus, clearly, these identified critical nursing behaviors have implication for provision of nursing care, as well as indicating areas where further research is required.