Mark Allen Holdings Limited

Background: Burden and distress among family carers of people living with motor neurone disease (MND) are reported widely. Evidence-based screening tools to help identify these carers' needs and plan appropriate support are urgently needed. Aim: To pilot the Carers' Alert Thermometer (CAT), a triage tool developed to identify carers' needs, with family carers of people living with MND to determine its usefulness in identifying their need for support.

Family carers play a central role in community-based palliative care. However, caring for a terminally ill person puts the carer at increased risk of physical and mental morbidity. The Carer Support Needs Assessment Tool (CSNAT) enables comprehensive assessment of carer support needs. The present study aimed to identify barriers and facilitators to implementing the CSNAT in a community specialist palliative care service. Semi-structured interviews with 12 palliative care nurse specialists from two community nursing teams in Lothian, Scotland, June 2017.

Family carers of people with dementia often describe feelings of guilt, grief and low mood, and are also at increased risk of clinical depression. Through a skilled assessment of a carer’s feelings of guilt, an Admiral Nurse identified specific psychological approaches helpful in relieving this potentially damaging and paralysing phenomenon.

Background: People with intellectual disabilities are living longer, with increasingly complex needs and their family caregivers may have a broad scope of unmet needs. Aims: To identify the most common needs of family caregivers, to identify gaps in the literature, and distinguish the information needs of family caregivers of people with intellectual disabilities who require palliative care. Methods: This two phase literature review used five electronic databases (CINAHL, PsycINFO, Medline, Cochrane and Pubmed).

Background: Family caregivers have a significant role in Thai healthcare, taking on responsibilities of health professionals. The purpose of this research was to explore Thai family caregivers' experiences of providing palliative cancer care. Methods: This qualitative study took a phenomenological approach. In-depth interviews were conducted with 14 family caregivers aged 33–72 years in a regional hospital in the north of Thailand. The data was analysed using Colaizzi's phenomenological approach.