MEASURES OF FAMILY CAREGIVER STRAIN AND SATISFACTION

The overall goal of the proposed research is to develop close-ended self- report measures of caregiver role strain and satisfaction following life- sustaining treatments decisions for elderly relatives in a variety of health care settings. The long term goal of this proposed research is to develop measures of caregiver role strain and satisfaction will be useful in evaluating the adequacy of approaches to improve end-of-life care. Specific aims of the proposed research are: 1) to refine the conceptualization of caregiver role strain and satisfaction following life- sustaining treatments decision and obtained the conceptualization of caregiver role strain and satisfaction following life-sustaining treatments decisions and obtain suggestions for item wording; 2) to obtain evidence for content validity of the measures of caregiver role strain and satisfaction following life-sustaining treatment decisions; and 3) to pretest the new measures of caregiver role strain and satisfaction following life-sustaining treatments decisions. The preliminary framework is based on role theory. Descriptive studies of families' experiences of making life-sustaining treatment decisions suggest that health care providers can ease the decision-making process and its consequences by providing information and support to families. However, no existing decision-making process and its consequences by providing information and support to families. However, no existing instrument was found that measures the role strain and satisfaction experienced by caregivers making decisions about life-sustaining treatments for elderly relatives and no studies have been conducted evaluating strategies to provide information and support to these caregivers. Therefore, this study will begin to address these important gaps in research and practice.