Effects of family empowerment program on positive feelings and emotions in major caregivers of patients with uveitis

Abstract

Objective To explore the effects of family empowerment program on positive feelings and emotions in major caregivers of patients with uveitis. Methods The caregivers of the patients with uveitis who were admitted in the First Affiliated Hospital of Zhengzhou University from January 2015 to January 2018 were selected using convenient sampling and randomly divided into the control group (n=63) and the observation group (n=67) by drawing. Patients and caregivers in the control group received conventional education by charge nurses, while patients and caregivers in the control group were treated with the family empowerment program on this basis. Positive Aspects of Caregiving (PAC) and Profile of Mood States-Simplified (POMS-SF) were used to evaluate the effects of intervention at 24 h after admission and 1 d before discharge. Results The PAC score of the observation group totaled (29.91±6.42) , and that of the control group was (25.69±5.28) after the intervention (t=4.079; P<0.01) . The dimensions of nervousness-anxiety, depression-frustration, anger-hostility and fatigue-dullness in POMS-SF of the observation group scored (1.88±0.45) , (1.90±0.44) , (1.80±0.43) and (2.09±0.39) , respectively, lower than those of the control group, energy-activity (3.43±0.57) points, higher than that of the control group (t=-3.087, -9.941, -11.636, -7.876, 15.479; P<0.01) . Conclusions The family empowerment program used for major caregivers of patients with uveitis can improve the positive feelings and emotions of the caregivers, whose effects are better than conventional ophthalmological nursing care. Key words: Uveitis; Family empowerment; Caregivers; Positive feelings; Emotions