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Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool

PURPOSE: It is important to support families in dealing with the distress that comes along with the diagnosis and treatment of childhood cancer. Therefore, we developed a playful tool that families can use at home to support their family functioning and safeguard their normal family life. We pilot t...

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Autores principales: van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A., D’Olivo, Patrizia, Rozendaal, Marco C., Merks, Johannes H. M., Grootenhuis, Martha A.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2021
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8236466/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33550470
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00520-021-05995-3
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author van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A.
D’Olivo, Patrizia
Rozendaal, Marco C.
Merks, Johannes H. M.
Grootenhuis, Martha A.
author_facet van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A.
D’Olivo, Patrizia
Rozendaal, Marco C.
Merks, Johannes H. M.
Grootenhuis, Martha A.
author_sort van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A.
collection PubMed
description PURPOSE: It is important to support families in dealing with the distress that comes along with the diagnosis and treatment of childhood cancer. Therefore, we developed a playful tool that families can use at home to support their family functioning and safeguard their normal family life. We pilot tested this new tool called Mr.V and describe how families used and evaluated the tool, and how it could be further improved. METHODS: Mr.V is an interactive dispenser that looks like a spaceman and proposes family activities. These activities are suggested by family members themselves and dispensed by the machine at unexpected moments. Mr.V produced data on how it was used, and a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview were used to evaluate the experiences of families and the potential of this tool. RESULTS: Ten families with a child with cancer between 5 and 9 years old (M(age) = 6.7 years) who were in active treatment (mixed diagnoses) participated (n = 47; n(patients) = 10, n(siblings) = 9, n(parents) = 16). All families used Mr.V for multiple days and were very satisfied with the tool regarding its acceptability, feasibility, and potential effectiveness. They also had suggestions on how the tool could be further improved. CONCLUSION: Mr.V is an acceptable and feasible tool that can be implemented by families independently at home, regardless of their level of need for support. Mr.V promoted family activities and therefore has the potential to support family functioning and normal family life at home. Future research should further investigate the effectiveness of this tool.
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spelling pubmed-82364662021-07-09 Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A. D’Olivo, Patrizia Rozendaal, Marco C. Merks, Johannes H. M. Grootenhuis, Martha A. Support Care Cancer Original Article PURPOSE: It is important to support families in dealing with the distress that comes along with the diagnosis and treatment of childhood cancer. Therefore, we developed a playful tool that families can use at home to support their family functioning and safeguard their normal family life. We pilot tested this new tool called Mr.V and describe how families used and evaluated the tool, and how it could be further improved. METHODS: Mr.V is an interactive dispenser that looks like a spaceman and proposes family activities. These activities are suggested by family members themselves and dispensed by the machine at unexpected moments. Mr.V produced data on how it was used, and a questionnaire and a semi-structured interview were used to evaluate the experiences of families and the potential of this tool. RESULTS: Ten families with a child with cancer between 5 and 9 years old (M(age) = 6.7 years) who were in active treatment (mixed diagnoses) participated (n = 47; n(patients) = 10, n(siblings) = 9, n(parents) = 16). All families used Mr.V for multiple days and were very satisfied with the tool regarding its acceptability, feasibility, and potential effectiveness. They also had suggestions on how the tool could be further improved. CONCLUSION: Mr.V is an acceptable and feasible tool that can be implemented by families independently at home, regardless of their level of need for support. Mr.V promoted family activities and therefore has the potential to support family functioning and normal family life at home. Future research should further investigate the effectiveness of this tool. Springer Berlin Heidelberg 2021-02-07 2021 /pmc/articles/PMC8236466/ /pubmed/33550470 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00520-021-05995-3 Text en © The Author(s) 2021 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/) .
spellingShingle Original Article
van Bindsbergen, Kelly L. A.
D’Olivo, Patrizia
Rozendaal, Marco C.
Merks, Johannes H. M.
Grootenhuis, Martha A.
Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title_full Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title_fullStr Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title_full_unstemmed Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title_short Support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with Mr.V the Spaceman, a family-based activities tool
title_sort support for families at home during childhood cancer treatment: a pilot study with mr.v the spaceman, a family-based activities tool
topic Original Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8236466/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/33550470
http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00520-021-05995-3
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