Relationship Between Quality of Life of Children With Cancer and Caregiving Competence of Main Family Caregivers.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to describe the caregiver's proxy-report of the quality of life (QoL) of children with cancer and the main family caregiver's competence, and to examine the role of said competence and other care-related variables in their proxy-reported QoL of children with cancer. This was a cross sectional, correlation design study conducted with 97 main family caregivers of children between the ages of 8 and 12 years with cancer residing in Colombia. The following variables were collected: main family caregiver and child sociodemographic characteristics (Survey for Dyad Care; GCPC-UN-D), The Pediatric Quality of Life Inventory 4.0 Cancer Module, and the Competence Instrument (caregiver version). The mean of the children's QoL was 102.0 points, and the caregivers' competence score was 211.24. Caregiver's competence (t = 5.814, p < .01), marital status (t = 1.925, p < .05), time as a caregiver (t = 2.087, p < .05), number of hours spent caring for the child (t = 2.621, p < .05), and caregiver's previous caring experiences (t = 2.068, p < .05) were found to influence caregiver's proxy-report of the QoL of children with cancer. High competence in main family caregivers positively influence caregiver's proxy-report of the QoL of children with cancer. Study results also suggest that nurses should consider the caregivers' sociodemographic characteristics such as marital status, time as a caregiver, number of hours spent caring for the child, and caregiver's previous experiences because those aspects influence main family caregivers' proxy-report about their children's QoL.