The development of Caregivers, skills for improving Long Term Care Service to relieve family caregivers’ burdens

Abstract

 The practice of Home Visiting by Caregivers (CG) serves mostly to focus on the quality of life (QOL) of Long Term Care patients more than the quality of life of family caregivers who are coping with their loved ones’ suffering. The objective of this study is to develop Caregivers’ skills for improving Long Term Care Service to relieve family caregivers’ burdens. This Action research studies two sample groups. The first group is the development of Caregivers’ skills, A sample of 7 Caregivers, purposive sampling. The specification is 1) the need to develop health care skills of family caregivers 2) being a CG for LTC patients. The second group is the result of development of Caregivers’ skills, including 14 Family caregivers who participated in this study. The program includes 3 phases: 1) Preliminary study is a study about skilled home visit service of CG and QOL of family caregivers. 2) Program’s skill development process through Action Research process 3) to evaluate the results of the development of skilled home visit service of CG and QOL of family caregivers. Data were collected using questionnaire, observation, skilled home visit forms, and QOL forms the study duration was 10 months (July 2021- April 2022). Analysis through descriptive statistics was used for qualitative data analysis.

The research outcome has shown that 1. Caregivers’ skills development focuses on skills 1. communication skills includes six skills which are 1) knowledge 2) commitment 3) pleasant voice 4) encouraging learners to set practical goals to be healthy 5) giving the opportunity to participate 6) using the local language.  2. practical skills includes nine skills which are 1) measurement of weight, height, waist circumference, blood pressure and fingertip blood sugar. 2) health status records 3) reviewing knowledge 4) SKT meditation therapy 5) exercise by swing arms 6) hand massage 7) coconut shell stepping foot massage

1. Home visit skill development process, the program consists of 5 learning plans which take 32 hours 1) caring for LTC and Family caregivers 2) self-care skills activities which are based on 4E (Emotion, Eating, Exercise, and Elimination) 3) home visit skills 4) QOL assessment 5) lesson learned 3. Results of development phase includes 1) communication skills are at a very good level among four people and are at a good level among three people and practical skills are at a very good level overall. 2) The QOL of family caregivers are at a very good level among ten people and are at a good level among four people.