| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立台北護理學院 === 長期照護研究所 === 94 === Being Home ventilator-dependent is a long term care situation that a patient relying on a ventilator has tried many times to wean it in vain. The patient’s daily life is confined to the ventilator. What the patient needs is specialized and professional care. Thus, it’s important to pay more attention to the burden of a primary caregiver caring for Home ventilator-dependent patients.
This study was aimed at showing the burden of primary caregivers caring for home ventilator-dependent patients. It included the relationships between the demographic characteristics of the patient and the primary caregiver, social support and the primary caregiver’s burden. This was a cross-sectional design to collect the corresponding information through purposive samplings and structured questionnaires. 138 qualified subjects were recruited from patient-visiting lists of the home respiratory therapists who work with the facilities in the central and northern parts of Taiwan. With the permission of the original author,〝Functional Social Support Scale〞 with 16 questions and 〝Caregiver Burden Scale〞 with 24 questions are incorporated . Statistic analysis procedures included descriptive statistics, t-test, one-way ANOVA, post Scheffe’s test, Pearson product-moment correlation, Spearman rank order correlation coefficient, point-biserial (Eta) correlation and multiple regression by the commercial statistical software SPSS/PC 10.0.
The results of this study were shown in several folds as follows：(1) There were significant differences between the patient’s age (p< .001), oxygen concentration used on the ventilator (p< .05), the primary caregiver’s living with the patient or not (p< .05), the self-cognitive financial condition (p< .01) and the primary caregivers’ burden. (2) There were significant positive correlations between the caring hours per week of family members and primary caregiver’s burden. On the contrary, there are significant negative correlations among the patient’s occupation before the morbid conditions, age, the level of dependence, the oxygen concentration used on the ventilator and the caregiver’s living with the patient or not, self-perceived relationship with the patient, self-perceived financial status, self-perceived health status and the primary caregiver’s burden. (3) There were significant positive correlations between the need for social support and the primary caregiver’s burden. On the contrary, there were significant negative correlations among the support status of social support, the sufficient degree of social support and the primary caregiver’s burden. (4) The result of multiple regression in this study showed that the relationship among the oxygen concentration, Barthel Index, caregiver living together whatever, the status of social support, caring hours per week, self-perceived health status, the interaction of status of caregiver’s living together whatever can explain the 31% total variation of the primary caregiver’s burden who takes care of home ventilator-dependent patient.
The results of the study are intended to support the professional therapist engaged in home respiratory care to realize the primary caregiver’s burden and hence with some copying with. The results could also serve as the basis of teaching, further study and reference basis for related policy making. Ultimately, we hope the results could enable both the ventilator-dependent patients and primary caregivers to possess sufficient social support and lessen the burden of primary caregivers.
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