Cascading knowledge about end of life care at home: the development of a training programme for those who help carers and a carer resource pack

Project Duration

December 2012 - June 2015

Funder

Dimbleby Cancer Care/Marie Curie Cancer Care

Aims

1. To develop and pilot a training programme for volunteers and support workers who help carers providing home based end of life care. The programme will use the domains of an evidence based carer support needs assessment tool (CSNAT) as a framework. 
2. To develop a resource pack for carers, to enable them to identify and prioritise areas of need and facilitate discussion in each individual case of what support is most appropriate.

Methods

The project includes four phases of work: 

1. The development of a core resource pack for carers and a training needs analysis among volunteers and support workers 
2. The development of the training programme for volunteers and support workers 
3. Piloting of the training programme 
4. Revision of the training programme, publication of the training programme and resource pack, and dissemination

Stage of Development

“A resource pack has been developed and reviewed by research partners, support workers and researchers. The training programme, entitled ‘Supporting carers in end of life: An introductory programme' has been developed. It was piloted four times, and on each occasion an evaluation was carried out to enable revisions to be made. A group of critical readers also read and evaluated the training programme, enabling further revisions to be made. The programme was prepared for publication by members of the School of Health Sciences Health E-Learning and Media Team and is now available for use".