Resilience as a concept for understanding family caregiving of adults with Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD): an integrative review.
Francesca Rosa, Annamaria Bagnasco, Giuseppe Aleo and 2 others
PMID 28286662WHAT IT FOUND
COPD family caregivers often feel burdened, yet some describe coping day by day and finding reward.
Resilience may help nurses support them, but no tested intervention shows it works.
Key findings
01The term resilience was not used by researchers or practitioners working in COPD family caregiving.
02The review analysed 20 relevant papers: 12 focused on COPD patients and caregivers, and eight focused on other chronic diseases.
03Family caregivers of people with COPD need social and professional support so their physical and emotional health does not suffer.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
This is a concept review, not a trial, so it cannot show that resilience support improves caregiver health. The term resilience was not used in much of the COPD caregiving literature, so the authors applied a concept borrowed from other chronic conditions. The included studies covered different chronic illnesses, caregiver roles and study designs, so they may not apply to every COPD family. The review searched only English peer-reviewed articles, so relevant work in other languages or unpublished studies may have been missed. Many included studies used a deficit model focused on burden, and the review did not test interventions that build resilience.
Declared interests
The authors declared no conflict of interest and stated the research received no specific grant.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this as evidence that resilience support helps COPD caregivers. It is a concept review, and it did not test an intervention on caregiver health.