eHealth interventions for family carers of people with long term illness: a promising approach?
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Published version
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Family carers of people who have long term illness often experience physical and mental health morbidities, and burden. While there is good evidence to suggest that carers benefit from psychosocial interventions, these have primarily been delivered via face-to-face individual or group-formats. eHealth interventions offer a novel, accessible and self-paced approach to care delivery. Whether these are effective for carers' wellbeing has been little explored. This paper reports the first comprehensive systematic review in this area. A total of 78 studies, describing 62 discrete interventions, were identified. Interventions commonly aimed to promote carers' knowledge, self-efficacy, caregiving appraisal, and reduce global health morbidities. Interventions were offered to carers of people with a wide range of long term illness; dementia has been the most researched area, as reported in 40% of studies. Clinical and methodological heterogeneity in interventions precluded meta-analyses, and so data were analysed narratively. The most popular approach has comprised psychoeducational interventions delivered via an enriched online environment with supplementary modes of communication, such as network support with professionals and peers. Overall, carers appreciate the flexibility and self-paced nature of eHealth interventions, with high rates of satisfaction and acceptability. More studies using robust designs are needed to extend the evidence base.
Date Issued
2018-03-01
Online Publication Date
2018-03-01
Date Acceptance
2018-01-31
ISSN
0272-7358
Publisher
Elsevier
Start Page
109
End Page
125
Journal / Book Title
Clinical Psychology Review
Volume
60
Copyright Statement
© 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/)
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/29429856
S0272-7358(17)30081-8
Subjects
Social Sciences
Psychology, Clinical
Psychology
Family
Carers - eHealth/e-health/rnHealth/m-health - online/web-based/internee
Interventions - long term/chronic illness
TRAUMATIC BRAIN-INJURY
INTERNET-BASED INTERVENTION
RANDOMIZED CONTROLLED-TRIAL
HEART-FAILURE PATIENTS
WEB-BASED INTERVENTION
ONLINE SUPPORT GROUP
GUIDED SELF-HELP
DEMENTIA CAREGIVERS
INFORMAL CAREGIVERS
PSYCHOEDUCATIONAL INTERVENTION
Carers - eHealth/e-health/mHealth/m-health - online/web-based/internet
1701 Psychology
Clinical Psychology
Publication Status
Published
Country
United States
Date Publish Online
2018-02-02