Volunteers(with clinical nursing or social work backgrounds) needed

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Caring for the Caregiver

Background

This project ultimately intends to improve the quality of life (QOL) of family caregivers (FCGs) of terminally ill patients. The literature shows that many FCGs experience symptoms of their own including insomnia, depression, fatigue and overall reduced QOL which impacts on their health, longevity and efficacy as a caregiver. Family caregivers (FCGs) play a vital role in the care and support of patients with terminal diseases. Many FCG intervention studies have found proved quality of life (QOL) for FCGs. Several prominent authors have concluded that the next logical steps should be to expand these tested and evidence-based models of family caregiver support in to clinical practice. That is what this program proposes to do.

Project Goals

The specific goal of this program is to improve physical and psycho-social outcomes for family caregivers (FCGs) of terminally ill patients. This will be done utilizing a curriculum to train volunteer navigators to assess stress related issues, and then deliver interventions to FCGs.

Volunteer navigators with a background in social work, nursing, or medicine will undergo 15-20 hours of training under the direction of Dr. Forman and national experts in the field of caregiving. Based on the specific individualized needs, these volunteer navigators will deliver interventions known to have a high probability of addressing these problems.

Description of Partners

Trinity Health at Home (THH) have created a volunteer-mediated, home-based intervention program to enhance patient and family caregiver (FCG) quality of life. Together, JHCN and THH care for more than 300 terminally ill patients daily and more than 1,000 each year. It is estimated that through this proposal, up to 500 FCGs will have access to these evidence-based interventions annually.

Plan and Specific Activities

In collaboration with national experts in the field Dr. Jeffrey Forman (JHCN) has initiated a novel pilot program utilizing trained volunteer navigators (with clinical nursing or social work backgrounds) to deliver the best practices identified in the fields of caregiving research to FCGs. Targeting the FCGs of the palliative care and hospice patients served by both JHCN and THH, the goals of this program are to improve the quality of life for both the participating patients and their caregivers.

Unlike previously published studies which relied heavily on employed nurses and other trained staff, this approach will use volunteers (recruited by JHCN and THH) who will be trained by clergy, social workers, nurses and physicians who are experts in the field of caregiving, chronic illness, and palliative care. Very few organizations in the area currently provide similar services and none at no cost to the family. With its volunteer-based innovation, this model will make available evidence-based treatments to assist and support family caregivers. This program will offer proven interventions to caregivers as an accessible and affordable tool for treatment, healing, and support. It will also allow for sustainability as there is currently no request for medical reimbursement for this care.