Chemotherapy at home: keeping patients in their "natural habitat".

Escalating cancer rates and an increase in the complexity and duration of chemotherapy regimens have brought the issue of cancer treatment at home to the forefront. For the participants of this study, home chemotherapy was offered as a potential treatment choice. Ten patients who accepted home chemotherapy were interviewed using the methodology of interpretive description.

Influences shaping nurses' use of distraction for children's procedural pain.

Purpose: This study explored pediatric nurses' choices to use distraction for managing painful procedures.

Design And Methods: Using interpretive description approaches, interviews with pediatric nurses provided descriptions of choices to manage procedural pain.

Results: Nurses' distress influenced distraction use to mitigate the suffering of children and themselves.

The lived experience of family caregivers who provided end-of-life care to persons with advanced dementia.

Objective: Dementia is a terminal illness, and family caregivers play a vital role in providing end-of-life care to their relative. The present study begins to address the paucity of research regarding end-of-life caregiving experience with dementia.

Method: This study utilized Munhall's methodology for interpretive phenomenology.

Urinary incontinence and quality of life in children.

Objective: Urinary incontinence (UI) negatively affects children's quality of life (QOL). It is not known if parents are reliable informants on impact and QOL nor if lower urinary tract symptoms (LUTS) are related to QOL. We wished to determine the association between LUTS measured by the Dysfunctional Voiding Symptom Score (DVSS) and QOL measured by the Pediatric Urinary Incontinence QOL tool (PIN-Q), and to test the relationship between parent and patient's responses.

Patient and family caregiver decision making in the context of advanced cancer.

Background: A basic tenet of palliative care is to maintain an individual's control over the dying process. However, when decline occurs quickly, as may be the case in advanced cancer, transition of responsibility for illness management to a family caregiver may become necessary when care takes place in the home.

Objective: The aim of this study was to understand the decision-making process that occurs between a dying individual and his or her family caregiver.

Family caregivers and transition to long-term care.

This study's purpose was to explore family caregivers' experiences while they waited placement of family members with dementia in long-term care and how they coped during this period of waiting and transition. In this exploratory descriptive qualitative study, interviews were conducted with 29 caregivers at entry to the placement wait-list and at 3 to 4-month intervals thereafter. Final interviews, with 15 caregivers, were conducted shortly after admission to long-term care.

Finding and evaluating potential research instruments.

In this column, I have outlined some of the basic strategies for finding appropriate research instruments and for evaluating them so that you can determine the best one to use for your own research. These strategies, as basic as they are, will help to guide you as you make decisions. Of course, there are complex issues surrounding the development and refinement of research instruments and you would do well to review reliability, validity, and sensitivity in research texts before choosing an instrument.

Factors which influence coping: home-based family caregiving of persons with advanced cancer.

The findings from a qualitative study of how caregivers coped while they cared for a dying family member at home are presented. Fifteen family caregivers were interviewed twice following the death of their family member. Although it was not one of the original objectives of the research, coping emerged as a category needing further analysis.

The bereavement experience following home-based family caregiving for persons with advanced cancer.

The purpose of this qualitative interpretive study was to explore the experience of bereavement following home-based family caregiving for persons with advanced cancer. The research question addressed by this research was: How do family caregivers of patients with advanced cancer perceive the effects of home-based caregiving on their bereavement? Fifteen caregivers were retrospectively interviewed twice after the death of their family member. Caregivers reported both positive (e.

Prospective and retrospective research: considerations and questions.

We have outlined some of the reasons why retrospective research is generally considered inferior to prospective research and have explained some of the rationale for this view. Despite the problems, there are ethical and practical reasons for conducting retrospective research. Indeed, we have argued that there are times when retrospective research may produce more valid data.

Evidence-based practice: implications for the practising oncology nurse.

While the premises of EBP seem highly appropriate on the surface, disquieting questions are raised when one examines the implications for the practising oncology nurse of attempting to implement EBP. There are clinical situations for which no empirical evidence exists on which to base nursing decisions. In some cases, empirical evidence is sparse and based on a mix of small, descriptive studies.

The experience of respite during home-based family caregiving for persons with advanced cancer.

The purpose of this qualitative interpretive study was to explore the experience of respite during home-based family caregiving for persons with advanced cancer. Fifteen caregivers were interviewed twice after the death of their family member. Three main themes emerged from the data analysis.