Care For The Cancer Caregiver: A Meaning-Based Workshop To Help Manage Caregiver Burden

Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center (MSK)

Status: Completed

Conditions: Caregivers

Treatments: Other: webcasts; Other: Usual care; Behavioral: Assessments

Study type: Interventional

Funder types: Other

Identifiers

NCT02250911

14-208

Details and patient eligibility

About

The purpose of this study is to gather information on how easy it is to implement the workshop, as well as whether individuals find this workshop helpful. In this study, participants will be assigned at random to one of the two study groups. Based on the information we obtain, we hope to develop an easily accessible support service for caregivers.

Enrollment: 88 patients

Sex: All

Ages: 18+ years old

Volunteers: Accepts Healthy Volunteers

Inclusion criteria

• As per self report, a current caregiver to a patient with any site or stage of cancer
• Age 18 or over
• A score of > 4 on the Distress Thermometer (DT) and indication that this distress is related in some way to the caregiving role
• In the judgment of the investigators and/or consenting professional, able to comprehend English to complete study assessments
• Able to perform informed consent
• Enrollment is open to caregivers with their own current/past cancer histories

Exclusion criteria

• Significant psychiatric or cognitive disturbance sufficient, in the investigator's judgment, to preclude providing informed consent.
• As per self report, unable to access a computer with Internet or unable to use a computer with Internet provided by the study
• Participated in the development and refinement of the CCC Workshop (prospective exemption X14-006)

Trial design

Primary purpose: Other

Allocation: Randomized

Interventional model: Parallel Assignment

Masking: None (Open label)

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88 participants in 2 patient groups

This web-based CCC Workshop

Experimental group

Description:

The Care for the Cancer Caregivers (CCC) workshop is composed of six webcasts. The Introductory Webcast is based upon Sessions 1 and 2 of Meaning-Centered Psychotherapy for Cancer Caregivers (MCP-C) and provides participants with an introduction to the CCC Workshop, an overview of the different meaning-centered modules (i.e., legacy, choice, creativity, and connectedness), and a discussion about identity and how caregivers' identities have or have not changed since taking on this role.

Treatment:

Behavioral: Assessments

Other: webcasts

Waitlist Control

Active Comparator group

Description:

Participants randomized to the waitlist control arm will be offered what is considered "usual care" at the ACS: the provision of the ACS Telephone Hotline number (1-800- 227-2345) and direction to the ACS website (www.cancer.org) where participants can find many resources for caregivers, including links to the ACS Caregiver ToolKit. They will complete assessments at time points that correspond with the completion of assessments in the CCC Workshop arm: after consent as soon as they are able (T1), about 2 months (± 4 weeks) after T1 (T2), and about 2-3 months after T2 (T3). Upon completion of all study assessments the waitlist control arm participants will be offered the opportunity to complete the CCC Workshop.

Treatment:

Other: Usual care

Behavioral: Assessments