Assessment of burden and reaction in nurses providing a palliative care for children and adult having cancer

The phenomena of caregivers burden is a perceptual and multidimensional reaction experience. Caregivers experience distress and burden from assuming responsibility for performing complex medical procedure, providing support for patient and their families[Norton, 2007] ,This study aims at assessing level of burden and reactions experienced by the nurses who providing a palliative care for children and adult having cancer, by using A descriptive correlational design ,The study sample consisted of 132 nurses who are working in three health sectors AL Hussein Cancer Center [as a private sector], Royal Medical center and Al-basheer hospital [as a governmental sector],an official permission was obtained from the director of each hospital .Data collection tools include, Demographic Data Sheet about nurse's age, marital status, gender, level of graduation, years of experience and monthly income. Caregiver Burden Assessment Scale Zarit, [1980] and Caregiver Reaction Assessment Scale developed by Given et al.[1992].Results of the study revealed that ,oncology nurses who providing palliative care for cancer patients experience high level of burden and reaction at 2.69 mean score for overall burden and 0.55 18 S.D. total mean score for caregiver reaction was2 ,7 I and 0.516 S.D. There were statistically significance difference at 0.05 in all burden, reaction in all dimension except for financial problem reaction dimension and site of work, the study concluded that, nurses experience high level of burden. Also experience high level of reaction, for nurses to be effective in this area of care delivery and to improve patient outcomes, they must have the necessary skills and support. Therefore, a clinical supervision and action learning model with management, education, and support is important to address both the skill needs and support needs of registered nurses through the use of available resources