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Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND: Caring for a relative with dementia can be demanding and time-consuming. It is not uncommon for them to be overburdened and overworked, which can lead to symptoms of depression or anxiety disorders in 2/3 of cases. One possibility for treating family carers who have these issues is speci...

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Autores principales: Lessing, Susanne, Deck, Ruth, Berwig, Martin
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10273544/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37322489
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09579-1
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author Lessing, Susanne
Deck, Ruth
Berwig, Martin
author_facet Lessing, Susanne
Deck, Ruth
Berwig, Martin
author_sort Lessing, Susanne
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Caring for a relative with dementia can be demanding and time-consuming. It is not uncommon for them to be overburdened and overworked, which can lead to symptoms of depression or anxiety disorders in 2/3 of cases. One possibility for treating family carers who have these issues is special medical rehabilitation (rehab). However, studies have shown that while such rehab is effective, it is not sustainable. To increase the sustainability of rehab for this target group, structured telephone-based aftercare groups were implemented in the present study. A process evaluation was conducted focusing on the acceptability of the aftercare programme and its perceived benefits by the participating family carers and group moderators. METHODS: The process evaluation was embedded in a longitudinal randomized controlled trial and followed a mixed methods approach. Quantitative process data were collected using protocols and structured brief evaluations regarding the telephone-based aftercare groups. To assess the acceptability of the aftercare groups as well as their subjective evaluation by the participants, qualitative process data were collected through two longitudinal telephone-based interviews with a subsample of family carers as well as a focus group interview with the group moderators. RESULTS: Telephone-based aftercare groups provide acceptable and supportive experiences, and they are shown to be practicable. The content structure and the procedure of the group sessions could be easily implemented in everyday life after inpatient rehab. The topics addressed with each patient were met with a consistently positive response. Learning from the other group members and sharing a bond based on the experience of caring for a relative with dementia were evaluated as positive outcomes in the group. The universality of suffering as a central effective factor of group psychotherapy also played a decisive role in this telephone-based support group format for a shared bonding and strengthening experience in the groups and thus for their effectiveness. CONCLUSION: Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia are a useful and acceptable tool in the context of rehab aftercare. This location-independent aftercare programme could be adapted for other indications, focuses or topics in everyday care. TRIAL REGISTRATION: German Clinical Trials Register: DRKS00013736, 14/05/2018. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12913-023-09579-1.
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spelling pubmed-102735442023-06-17 Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial Lessing, Susanne Deck, Ruth Berwig, Martin BMC Health Serv Res Research BACKGROUND: Caring for a relative with dementia can be demanding and time-consuming. It is not uncommon for them to be overburdened and overworked, which can lead to symptoms of depression or anxiety disorders in 2/3 of cases. One possibility for treating family carers who have these issues is special medical rehabilitation (rehab). However, studies have shown that while such rehab is effective, it is not sustainable. To increase the sustainability of rehab for this target group, structured telephone-based aftercare groups were implemented in the present study. A process evaluation was conducted focusing on the acceptability of the aftercare programme and its perceived benefits by the participating family carers and group moderators. METHODS: The process evaluation was embedded in a longitudinal randomized controlled trial and followed a mixed methods approach. Quantitative process data were collected using protocols and structured brief evaluations regarding the telephone-based aftercare groups. To assess the acceptability of the aftercare groups as well as their subjective evaluation by the participants, qualitative process data were collected through two longitudinal telephone-based interviews with a subsample of family carers as well as a focus group interview with the group moderators. RESULTS: Telephone-based aftercare groups provide acceptable and supportive experiences, and they are shown to be practicable. The content structure and the procedure of the group sessions could be easily implemented in everyday life after inpatient rehab. The topics addressed with each patient were met with a consistently positive response. Learning from the other group members and sharing a bond based on the experience of caring for a relative with dementia were evaluated as positive outcomes in the group. The universality of suffering as a central effective factor of group psychotherapy also played a decisive role in this telephone-based support group format for a shared bonding and strengthening experience in the groups and thus for their effectiveness. CONCLUSION: Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia are a useful and acceptable tool in the context of rehab aftercare. This location-independent aftercare programme could be adapted for other indications, focuses or topics in everyday care. TRIAL REGISTRATION: German Clinical Trials Register: DRKS00013736, 14/05/2018. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12913-023-09579-1. BioMed Central 2023-06-15 /pmc/articles/PMC10273544/ /pubmed/37322489 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09579-1 Text en © The Author(s) 2023 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open Access This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
spellingShingle Research
Lessing, Susanne
Deck, Ruth
Berwig, Martin
Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title_full Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title_fullStr Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title_full_unstemmed Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title_short Telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
title_sort telephone-based aftercare groups for family carers of people with dementia – results of a mixed-methods process evaluation of a randomized controlled trial
topic Research
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10273544/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37322489
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s12913-023-09579-1
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