Impact of support group intervention on family system strengths of rural caregivers of stroke patients in India.

Objective: The objective of this study is to evaluate the impact of support group intervention on family system strengths of rural caregivers of stroke patients.

Design: True experimental pretest and post-test design was adopted for the study.

Setting: The study was conducted in Kattankulathur Block, a rural area in Kancheepuram district, India.

Participants: Two hundred forty caregivers of stroke patients were selected by simple random sampling technique.

Intervention: Enrolment in self-help groups and attending meetings were used as the interventional strategy for the purpose of this study.

Main Outcome Measure: The main outcome of the study was to evaluate the impact of support group intervention on family system strengths of rural caregivers of stroke patients.

Results: Following intervention, the mean score and the standard deviation of the experimental group increased to 44.73 and 5.83, respectively, the control group mean score remained at 22.08 and the standard deviation was 3.07 at t = 37.58. P value was 0.001, which is statistically significant at the confidence interval of 39.45%.

Conclusion: It was found that there was a significant and positive increase in the family system strengths of caregivers who participated in the self-help group meetings, thereby suggesting that support group intervention programs are an effective nursing strategy that can be employed for improving the overall well-being of the caregivers of stroke patients.