Exploring the Impact of Dementia in Samoan Culture: A Qualitative Study on Community Perspective.

Explore if and how American Samoan cultural norms influence caregivers' knowledge, attitudes, and care choices for person's living with Alzheimer's Dementia (AD). This pilot study used mixed methods. 1) Quantitative survey: measuring knowledge/attitudes towards AD (n = 80); 2) Qualitative techniques: a) Focus groups (n= 54) with caregivers; b) Semi-structured interviews (n=26) with health professionals; and c) In-depth interviews (n=3) with key informants.

Communication With Older Patients With Cancer Using Geriatric Assessment: A Cluster-Randomized Clinical Trial From the National Cancer Institute Community Oncology Research Program.

Importance: Older patients with cancer and their caregivers worry about the effects of cancer treatment on aging-related domains (eg, function and cognition). Quality conversations with oncologists about aging-related concerns could improve patient-centered outcomes. A geriatric assessment (GA) can capture evidence-based aging-related conditions associated with poor clinical outcomes (eg, toxic effects) for older patients with cancer.

Gender Bias Affects Assessment of Frailty and Recommendations for Surgery.

Background: Physician gender bias in surgical treatment recommendations is recognized but not well understood. This study hypothesized that gender differences may exist in interpretation of patients' physical behaviors and that these differences may be associated with decision making by providers and surrogate decision makers.

Methods: A pool of Amazon Mechanical Turk workers was solicited to participate in an online assessment.

Informal Caregiving in a Medically Underserved Community: Challenges, Construction of Meaning, and the Caregiver-Recipient Dyad.

Little is known about informal caregivers' challenges in medically underserved communities. This qualitative study explores their perceptions/experiences of caregiving in a medically underserved community in Midwest United States. Two focus groups ( = 12) were conducted and themes were extracted and analyzed.

Exploring physicians' verbal and nonverbal responses to cues/concerns: Learning from incongruent communication.

Objectives: Explore physicians' verbal and nonverbal responses to cues/concerns in consultations with older-patients.

Methods: Two teams independently coded a sample of Norwegian consultations (n=24) on verbal and nonverbal dimensions of communication using VR-CoDES and NDEPT instruments. Consultations exploring older-patients' verbal emotional expressions were labeled 'Acknowledging of patients' emotional expressions', and 'Distancing from patients' emotional expressions.

Patients' perceptions and attitudes on recurrent prostate cancer and hormone therapy: Qualitative comparison between decision-aid and control groups.

Objective: To compare patients' attitudes towards recurrent prostate cancer (PCa) and starting hormone therapy (HT) treatment in two groups-Decision-Aid (DA) (intervention) and Standard-of-care (SoC) (Control).

Methods: The present research was conducted at three academic clinics-two in the Midwest and one in the Northeast U.S.

Nurses' perceptions of pain management for older-patients in the Emergency Department: A qualitative study.

Objectives: 1) Identify themes arising from nurses' perceptions of assessing older-patients' pain; 2) use themes to guide development of optimal interventions to improve quality of pain assessment in the emergency department (ED).

Methods: Nurse interviews (n=20) were conducted until theme saturation. They were transcribed, coded, and analyzed using qualitative methodology.

Geriatric Assessment-Guided Care Processes for Older Adults: A Delphi Consensus of Geriatric Oncology Experts.

Background: Structured care processes that provide a framework for how oncologists can incorporate geriatric assessment (GA) into clinical practice could improve outcomes for vulnerable older adults with cancer, a growing population at high risk of toxicity from cancer treatment. We sought to obtain consensus from an expert panel on the use of GA in clinical practice and to develop algorithms of GA-guided care processes.

Methods: The Delphi technique, a well-recognized structured and reiterative process to reach consensus, was used.

Medical students as hospice volunteers: reflections on an early experiential training program in end-of-life care education.

Background: Despite an increase in the content of palliative medicine curricula in medical schools, students are rarely exposed to end-of-life (EOL) care through real-patient experiences during their preclinical education.

Objective: To evaluate the utility and impact of exposure to EOL care for first year medical students (MS-1s) through a hospice volunteer experience.

Methods: Patients and Families First (PFF), a hospice volunteer training program in EOL care, was piloted on three cohorts of MS-1s as an elective.

Perceptions, attitudes, and experiences of hematology/oncology fellows toward incorporating geriatrics in their training.

The aging of the U.S. population continues to highlight emerging issues in providing care generally for older adults and specifically for older adults with cancer.

Physician eye contact and elder patient perceptions of understanding and adherence.

Objective: To Examine physician eye contact (EC), patient understanding and adherence.

Methods: Secondary analysis of National Institute of Aging videotapes (N=52) of physician-elder patients in two visit types: (1) routine (n=20); (2) anxiety-provoking (n=32) was conducted. Self-reports of understanding and adherence were used.

Patient trust in physicians and shared decision-making among African-Americans with diabetes.

This study explores patient trust in physicians and its relationship to shared decision-making (SDM) among African-Americans with diabetes (types 1 and 2). We conducted a series of focus groups (n = 27) and in-depth interviews (n = 24). Topic guides were developed utilizing theoretical constructs.

"One Can Learn From Other People's Experiences": Latino adults' preferences for peer-based diabetes interventions.

Purpose: To assess Latino adults' preferences for peer-based diabetes self-management interventions and the acceptability of the church setting for these interventions.

Methods: The authors partnered with 2 predominantly Mexican American churches in Chicago and conducted 6 focus groups with 37 adults who had diabetes or had a family member with diabetes. They assessed participant preferences regarding group education and telephone-based one-to-one peer diabetes self-management interventions.

Integrating diabetes self-management interventions for mexican-americans into the catholic church setting.

Churches provide an innovative and underutilized setting for diabetes self-management programs for Latinos. This study sought to formulate a conceptual framework for designing church-based programs that are tailored to the needs of the Latino community and that utilize church strengths and resources. To inform this model, we conducted six focus groups with mostly Mexican-American Catholic adults with diabetes and their family members (N = 37) and found that participants were interested in church-based diabetes programs that emphasized information sharing, skills building, and social networking.

Nurses' attitudes and experiences surrounding palliative sedation: components for developing policy for nursing professionals.

Background: Nurses play an integral role in providing care for patients with end of life (EOL) symptoms refractory to conventional treatments and that may necessitate palliative sedation (PS). A paucity of research on nurses' attitudes, knowledge, and experience with PS exists, despite nurses being instrumental in evaluating its appropriateness and carrying out the care plan.

Objective: The objective of the study was to elicit nurses' perspectives and conceptualizations of knowledge and skills needed to administer PS in order to inform development of a hospital policy that addresses identified concerns.

Fecal bacteriotherapy for ulcerative colitis: patients are ready, are we?

Background: Fecal bacteriotherapy (FB) has been proposed as a safe and effective alternative treatment for a number of gastrointestinal conditions including ulcerative colitis (UC). We performed a qualitative study to explore the attitudes and concerns of adult patients and parents of children with UC regarding FB as a potential treatment.

Methods: We conducted six focus groups for adult patients with UC and parents of children with UC or indeterminate colitis.

Eye contact in patient-centered communication.

Objective: To understand the relationship between eye contact and patient-centered communication (PC) in physician-elder patient interactions.

Methods: Two instruments-Patient-centered Behavior Coding Instrument (PBCI) and Eurocommunication Global Ratings Scale-were used to measure PC in 22 National Institute of Aging videotapes. Eye contact was measured using a refined eye contact scale in NDEPT.

Race and shared decision-making: perspectives of African-Americans with diabetes.

Shared decision-making (SDM) is an important component of patient-centered healthcare and is positively associated with improved health outcomes (e.g. diabetes and hypertension control).

Palliative Access Through Care at Home: experiences with an urban, geriatric home palliative care program.

The aging of the U.S. population has resulted in a large number of persons with multiple, chronic illnesses and gradual functional decline.

Barriers and facilitators to shared decision-making among African-Americans with diabetes.

Introduction: Shared decision-making (SDM) between patients and their physicians is associated with improved diabetes health outcomes. African-Americans have less SDM than Whites, which may contribute to diabetes racial disparities. To date, there has been little research on SDM among African-Americans.

How is shared decision-making defined among African-Americans with diabetes?

Objective: This study investigates how shared decision-making (SDM) is defined by African-American patients with diabetes, and compares patients' conceptualization of SDM with the Charles model.

Methods: We utilized race-concordant interviewers/moderators to conduct in-depth interviews and focus groups among a purposeful sample of African-American patients with diabetes. Each interview/focus group was audio-taped, transcribed verbatim and imported into Atlas.

Communicating with older diabetes patients: self-management and social comparison.

Objective: The health status and life experiences of older diabetes patients may be highly heterogeneous, thus making their perspectives particularly relevant for developing individualized self-management plans for this population. Our earlier research showed older diabetes patients' healthcare goals and self-management behaviors are frequently shaped through social comparisons with peers/family members. The present paper explores this role of social comparison in their self-management practices and develops a conceptual model depicting the process.

Community and family perspectives on addressing overweight in urban, African-American youth.

Objective: To assess weight-related beliefs and concerns of overweight urban, African-American children, their parents, and community leaders before developing a family-based intervention to reduce childhood overweight and diabetes risk.

Design: We conducted 13 focus groups with overweight children and their parents and eight semistructured interviews with community leaders.

Participants And Setting: Focus group participants (N = 67) from Chicago's South Side were recruited through flyers in community sites.