Home-based physical symptom management for family caregivers: systematic review and meta-analysis

Background Patients with life-limiting conditions are often cared for at home by family, typically without adequate training to carry out the challenging tasks performed. This systematic review assessed the efficacy of interventions designed to help family caregivers manage pain and other symptoms in adults and children with life-limiting conditions at home. Methods A systematic search was performed on seven databases. A narrative synthesis was conducted, along with a meta-analysis comparing outcomes in those who received an intervention to those who did not, or to preintervention scores. Results 84 eligible studies were identified. Significant improvements in pain and fatigue in patients with cancer were found compared with patients in the control group and baseline. Caregivers of patients with cancer receiving an intervention, compared with the control group caregivers, showed significant improvements in self-efficacy and active coping and lower avoidant coping. This group also showed significant improvements in burden, self-efficacy, anxiety and depression, and decreases in avoidant coping pre- to post intervention. Patients with dementia whose caregivers received an intervention showed significantly reduced pain intensity and improvements in quality of life pre- to post intervention. Caregivers of patients with dementia showed significantly reduced distress pre- to post intervention. No beneficial effects were found for caregivers of patients with Parkinson’s disease or heart failure, although only limited analyses could be performed. Conclusions Interventions targeting family caregivers can improve both patient symptoms and caregiver outcomes, as demonstrated in cancer and dementia care. Future mixed-methods research should collect data from caregiver and patient dyads, identifying key intervention components. There is also need for more studies on caregivers of paediatric patients.