Vlogging Cancer: Predictors of Social Support in YouTube Cancer Vlogs.

Social support research has demonstrated the physical and psychological benefits of social support for patients, but has done little to identify successful strategies for eliciting social support. However, contemporary digital channels offer new ways to examine this issue. In particular, this study explores vlogging as a coping strategy for cancer patients and a context in which to explore predictors of online social support. A content analysis of 69 YouTube vlogs and 869 associated comments was performed. A series of multilevel binomial logistic regression analyses revealed that narrative features that position the cancer patient as protagonist-including providing an explanation of the diagnosis experience, agentive problem solving, and positive reappraisal of the situation-were associated with receiving empathic support. In contrast, moralizing pleads for audience checkups decreased the likelihood of receiving empathic support. Findings contribute to an undertheorized body of research that also has translational value for patients, doctors, and designers of supportive online spaces who might eventually recommend narrative vlogging in clinical settings.

OA37†Compassionate classrooms: supporting teachers to support children living with grief and loss.

BACKGROUND: Milford Care Centre's social work service is often contacted by teachers following a death within the school community. The team recognised the need to engage in a more proactive, health-promoting manner to help teachers normalise the experience of grief and loss, empowering them to provide support to pupils following bereavement. AIM: To develop and evaluate a brief intervention for teachers, as part of Milford Care Centre's Compassionate Communities programme, to support children experiencing bereavement. METHODS: A five-hour experiential workshop was developed and piloted with (1) a group of teachers and (2) staff working with early school completion programmes across the City. The teacher workshop was evaluated using a pre/post design measuring death anxiety and self-reported confidence. A qualitative evaluation, of both workshops will be presented from both the facilitator and participant perspective. RESULTS: The pilot highlighted that the intervention is acceptable and demonstrated both a significant reduction in death anxiety and improvement in self-reported confidence for teachers who participated. CONCLUSIONS: The Compassionate Classrooms: Working with Grief and Loss intervention can reduce death anxiety and improve teachers' confidence. The intervention will be shared with the audience for local adaptation.

OA38†From service delivery to community enablement: a public health approach to palliative care.

: Milford Care Centre is the only hospice in Ireland to make a strategic decision to embrace a public health approach to palliative care, through the development, implementation and evaluation of the Compassionate Communities Project. This presentation seeks to examine why Milford made the decision to move toward a community enablement model, describes the development and implementation of the Compassionate Communities Project to date, presents key findings from recent evaluations and highlights our plans for the future. The presentation uses a reflective, story telling approach to meet it's aims, coupled with data and statistics gathered from the evaluations, and includes a new short film 'Tell Me' developed by recent Computer Science graduates for the Project to use to engage with communities during Café Conversations. The presentation will highlight the relevance of Health Promoting Palliative Care theory to the development of a three-tier model of programme activity, examine the challenges in implementing such an approach and will discuss the impact of upstream intervention to downstream service provision using case studies.

OA39†Digging a hole planting a seed water it and watch it start to grow, grow, grow.

BACKGROUND: Milford Care Centre's Compassionate Communities Project uses a seed grant scheme to engage with communities around illness, dying, death and bereavement. The scheme, now in it's 3(rd) cycle strives to inspire and support the work of local groups, organisations and individuals who wish to mark in some tangible way their response to the universal realities of death, dying, loss and care as lived and experienced by those living within their communities. A key requirement for the receipt of a grant is that the level of funding must be matched either in cash or in kind. AIM: This presentation will report on the projects supported, describing the short and medium term impact they have had on the local community. METHOD: A short film will showcase the projects. Qualitative interviews were conducted with all grant recipients to determine the impact of the seed grant at a community level. RESULTS: Seed grants were used in a variety of ways, for example: Supporting a community group to develop a reflection space Supporting a youth project to explore what death, dying, loss and care means to service users through the creative arts. Supporting a library to develop a bereavement information 'resource'. Supporting local groups to run a community event aimed at increasing awareness and knowledge about 'healthy' ways of coping with loss and grief. Supporting those seeking practical ways of providing support to other living with illness and loss. CONCLUSIONS: The seed grant scheme offers a low cost, high impact approach to working with communities.

OA41†How can we support people living with death, dying, loss and care using animation? social workers reflect on the compassionate communities 'let's talk' films.

BACKGROUND: Milford Care Centre's Compassionate Communities Project has developed a series of animated films - The 'Let's Talk' Series. These films are used by the project to encourage people to have think about having difficult conversations about illness and death. The films are available on the project website, via You Tube and are shown during Café Conversations as part of the Compassionate Communities Project. More recently, members of the Specialist Palliative Care Social Work department have been using the films during their direct work with patients and their families. AIM: This presentation aims to introduce participants to the Let's Talk film series and describe the learning from social workers who have used the films at home, and in the inpatient unit, with patients, their partners and their children. METHOD: Social workers were interviewed, sharing their experience and reflection on using the animated films as a practice tool. RESULTS: A number of case studies will be presented to describe the use and impact of the films in practice. CONCLUSION: The films are a very useful addition to the social work toolbox. Guidelines for their use in practice will be presented.

Evaluation of a combined polymer system for use in relieving the symptoms of xerostomia.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this series of studies on rheological, sensory, and mucoadhesive properties was to evaluate the potential of using a combined polymer system to more closely represent the adaptive nature of saliva, while providing long lasting relief from the symptoms of xerostomia. METHODOLOGY: The rheological investigations were conducted on 1% polymer solutions 24 hours after preparation, during which time they were stored in sealed glass containers at room temperature. The rheometer was controlled via peltier to 35 degrees C +/- 0.1 degrees C, and a shear rate range of 0.1 to 300 s(-1) was applied; thirty measurements were taken during each run. Eight panelists were recruited from the in-house sensory panel at GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Weybridge to take part in the sensory evaluation. A brief training session was conducted at the start of the study in order to standardize the panelists' responses to the sensory term "tacky." For each test, panelists were given 10 ml of the respective polymer solution and instructed to swirl this solution around their mouths for 20 seconds before expectorating. The panelists were then asked to evaluate the solution in terms of "tack," measured by tapping the tongue on the roof of the mouth. A new formulation, based upon the rheology and sensory testing, was evaluated versus other commercially available sprays for the relief of xerostomia. The new formulation, named OASIS, contains a combination of Xanthan gum, carboxymethyl cellulose and a polyvinyl pyrollidone backboned polymer. To evaluate mucoadhesion of this final product, a 16 mm diameter cylindrical aluminium probe was selected. The probe and the base platform were both coated with a thin layer of artificial polyurethane membrane to more closely mimic the oral mucosal surface. The probe was set to travel downward at 2.0 mm/sec until it made contact with the base platform with a force of 1000 g. The two surfaces were then left in contact for 30 seconds before the probe receded from the base platform at 0.5 mm/sec to a distance of 10 mm. A plot of force versus distance was obtained, and the area under the curve (defined as the Work of Adhesion, energy required to separate the two surfaces) was used as a measure of the mucoadhesion of the materials. RESULTS: For rheology, the Xanthan gum solution showed high initial viscosity of 32 Pa.s at 0.1 s(-1) with rapid shear thinning to 4.0 Pa.s. By 1.2 s(-1) the viscosity continued to drop with increasing shear rate to 0.05 Pa.s at 300 s(-1). For the sensory assessment, the CMC single solution was perceived to be significantly (p = 0.04) more tacky than the CMC + PVP solution. The Xanthan + PVP solution was perceived to be less tacky (slightly/moderately tacky) than the Xanthan solution (moderately tacky). The Xanthan + CMC + PVP solution was perceived to be less tacky (slightly tacky) than the Xanthan + CMC solution (moderately tacky). Overall, there was a significant difference in favor of the inclusion of PVP across the products (p = 0.038), which was also shown to be a consistent effect across the different polymer solutions. CONCLUSION: The sensory solution work indicates that the addition of a PVP backbone polymer within an anionic polymer solution (OASIS) enables higher concentrations of mucoadhesive polymer to be included within a dry mouth formulation, while at the same time giving improved mouth-feel due to reduced tack.

Subjective assessment of a new moisturizing mouth spray for the symptomatic relief of dry mouth.

OBJECTIVE: A randomized clinical trial (Study 1) and consumer usage test (Study 2) were conducted to evaluate the acceptability and efficacy of OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray in subjects experiencing dry mouth. METHODOLOGY: Study 1: A randomized, single-blind, four-arm crossover clinical trial was conducted in 24 subjects, ranging from 50-84 years of age, to evaluate OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray and two experimental mouth spray formulations, and compare their performance to a reference (marketed) mouth spray, SALIVEZE. Following a three-day acclimatization phase, subjects used all four products at home for three days. Each treatment phase was separated by a three-day washout period. Study 2: One-hundred twenty subjects participated in a three-week home usage consumer test using OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray, after which they completed a 52-question online survey exploring sensory, efficacy, and resultant quality of life attributes of the product. RESULTS: Study 1: On average, subjects used the four test products 2-3 times per day. OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray was found to be effective in relieving dry mouth in the study population, as evidenced by a statistically significant feeling of coating the mouth (p < 0.05), and statistically significantly longer dry mouth relief (p < 0.005) than the commercial control. The OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray was statistically significantly (p < 0.05) better and preferred over the other product tested. All the products used in the study were well-tolerated. Study 2: On a five-point scale, 73% of respondents perceived the OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray as "very good" or "excellent," and more than 60% gave the product an "excellent" or "very good" rating on sensory, efficacy, and quality of life attributes. CONCLUSION: These studies show that OASIS Mouth Moisturizing Spray helped provide dry mouth relief and was well liked by the study population.