Literature reviews

Introduction: The transition into adulthood is a developmental stage within the life cycle. A chronic childhood condition can disrupt this transition and create major challenges for both the young person and his or her family. Little is known about families' experiences when living with a rare genetic disease. Therefore, the purpose of this literature review was to understand experiences of families living with a chronic childhood disease during transition into adulthood by integrating evidence.

AIM: To explore the role of prisoner caregivers in providing peer social care to older prisoners and to identify methodological information and challenges to conducting research in prisons, to inform future research in this setting. METHOD: The literature review was conducted in two stages. In the first stage, a systematic literature review was undertaken to retrieve articles related to prisoner caregiving. The main themes from these articles were identified.

As the population ages, there is a growing need for families and friends to support frail older adults in their home. Although many family caregivers report feeling satisfied with their caring role, a growing number of caregivers also feel physically, emotionally, and financially drained by the experience. The purpose of this literature review is to explore the experience of compassion fatigue (CF) among family caregivers, and to suggest strategies to combat this possible consequence of caregiving.

Glioma patients are not only confronted with the diagnosis and treatment of cancer, but also with disease-specific symptoms that greatly affect everyday life. Common symptoms among patients include motor dysfunction, sensory loss, seizures, cognitive deficits, changes in behaviour and personality, mood issues, and fatigue. This review focuses on family caregivers, for whom dealing with the diagnosis and treatment of a brain tumour in their loved one while managing disease-specific symptoms can be challenging.

The experience of being a carer of a person with dementia at the end of life is expressed in these 12 accounts. This is a synthesis of the concerns and challenges for carers at the end of life. These accounts are often insightful and provide several views of carers’ and professionals’ experience. Having a close relationship as a carer gives a unique and poignant view. What emerges from this review is a range of perspectives that provide contrasting views of the heterogeneity of carers and professionals.

BACKGROUND: The issue of diagnostic disclosure in dementia has been debated extensively in professional journals, but empirical data concerning disclosure in dementia has not previously been systematically reviewed.

OBJECTIVE: To review empirical data regarding diagnostic disclosure in dementia.

This paper updates an earlier extensive review of research into the incidence and management of risk in adult social care in England, and addresses gaps identified in the earlier review. This paper aimed to identify only empirical research published since 2007 and concentrated on research conducted and published within the UK.

The authors review current research on provision of services to older people and their carers in remote and rural areas across the UK, with specific reference to Scotland. They consider the policy implications for dementia services in this context.

Background: providing support to a family member with dementia often comes at a cost to the quality of life (QoL) of the carer (caregiver), giving rise to current and future unmet needs for health and social care and support themselves. These have important implications for costeffective health and social care support services and pathways.