Evaluation of Caregiver Burden of Family Members Providing Support for the Care of Patients Undergoing Brain Surgery at the Hospital

AIM: The brain regulates various functions which control and coordinate the body. As brain surgeries influence the structures that regulate body functions, they can cause serious complications in patients, such as disability or death. This study aimed to determine the caregiver burden of family members providing support for the care of patients who had undergone brain surgery. METHOD: The descriptive study was done with family members of 102 patients who had surgery at the neurosurgery department of a university hospital in Turkey. Data were collected using the descriptive features form for the patients, descriptive features form for the care providing family members, Zarit Care Load Scale adjusted for the clinic, and Barthel daily living activities index. RESULTS: The results of the study revealed that patients undergoing neurosurgery were dependent to an extreme level and that care providing family members had mild or moderate level of care load. A statistically significant difference was found between the averages of family members and their age, sex, marital status, education level, monthly income level, and working status (p < .05). CONCLUSION: As the level of dependency of the patients undergoing neurosurgery increased, the load of the family members providing care also increased. It would be beneficial to evaluate the support sources owned by care providing family members for taking care of patients and to direct them to people and institutions from where they could get assistance.