Cancer is among the most prevalent chronic health disorders that can lead to impaired functioning and mortality in the elderly. Advances in cancer detection and treatment are increasing cancer patients' survival and making it possible for many patients to be managed on an outpatient basis and remain in the community. The availability of family members to provide ongoing care to elderly cancer patients is central to maintaining them in the community longer, and preventing or delaying their hospitalization. Familial caregivers, however, can experience myriad stresses associated with their support provision. The cumulative impact of these stresses over time may diminish their ability or willingness to continue the provision of aid, with detrimental consequences for the community-based care of the elderly patient. The proposed longitudinal study will investigate the psychosocial impact for adult daughters of assuming caregiving responsibilities for an elderly parent diagnosed with cancer. It will focus on the chronic phase of the illness, examining the circumstances through which caregiving places these daughters at increased risk for psychological morbidity.
The specific aims are: (l) To describe the changes that take place over the disease course in the burdens and psychological morbidity (e.g., depression and anxiety) experienced by caregiving daughters providing informal emotional support and practical assistance to their elderly parents, following the parents' initiation of treatment for cancer. (2) To determine the relative importance of basic sociodemographic variable sets and changes in other variable sets as predictors of changes in the caregiving daughters' psychological morbidity over the disease course. These variable sets, containing potential risk and protective factors, include: (a) caregiver characteristics; (b) patient characteristics; (c) disease/treatment characteristics; (d) situational factors; (e) caregiving consequences (e.g., objective and subjective burdens experienced); and (f) caregiver coping resources (e.g., social and psychological resources). (3) To investigate the direct and indirect effects of the above mentioned sociodemographic variable sets and changes in the above mentioned potential risk and protective factors on changes in caregiving daughters' psychological morbidity over time. (4) To develop a caregiver risk profile that could be employed to target familial caregivers at need for intervention and professional assistance. A prospective longitudinal research design will be adopted, in which a sample of 300 elderly cancer outpatients, aged 60 and older, and their caregiving daughters will each be interviewed three times at six month intervals, beginning two months after the elderly parent initiates treatment.
| Raveis, V H; Karus, D G; Siegel, K (1998) Correlates of depressive symptomatology among adult daughter caregivers of a parent with cancer. Cancer 83:1652-63 |
