title: Assessing caregivers for team interventions (ACT): a new paradigm for comprehensive hospice quality care.
abstract: This article provides a framework labeled ACT that aims to successfully integrate family caregivers and patients into one unit of care, as dictated by the hospice philosophy. ACT (assessing caregivers for team interventions) is based on the ongoing assessment of the caregiver background context, primary, secondary, and intrapsychic stressors as well as outcomes of the caregiving experience and subsequently, the design and delivery of appropriate interventions to be delivered by the hospice interdisciplinary team. Interventions have to be tailored to a caregiver's individual needs; such a comprehensive needs assessment allows teams to customize interventions recognizing that most needs and challenges cannot be met by only one health care professional or only one discipline. The proposed model ensures a holistic approach to address the multifaceted challenges of the caregiving experience.
authors.affiliation: School of Nursing, University of Washington, Seattle, WA 98195, USA. gdemiris@u.washington.edu
authors.forename: George
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Demiris
authors.forename: Debra Parker
authors.initials: DP
authors.lastname: Oliver
authors.forename: Elaine
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Wittenberg-Lyles
mesh_terms: D001293:Attitude to Death; D017028:Caregivers / Q000458:organization & administration*; D003299:Cooperative Behavior; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006701:Home Nursing / Q000458:organization & administration*; D017051:Hospice Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006801:Humans; D008962:Models, Theoretical; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy; D010348:Patient Care Team / Q000458:organization & administration*; D011369:Professional-Patient Relations; D011787:Quality of Health Care / Q000458:organization & administration