Jane Claxton-Oldfield

A Survey of Family Members’ Satisfaction With the Services Provided by Hospice Palliative Care Volunteers:

A total of 22 family members, whose deceased loved ones had used the services of a hospice palliative care volunteer, responded to a brief survey designed to assess the importance of the different kinds of support offered to them (family members) by the volunteer, their impressions of the volunteers’ personal qualities/characteristics, their general experiences with the volunteer, and their overall satisfaction with the volunteer services. The kind of support that received the highest importance rating from family members was the opportunity to take a much-needed break from the demands of caring for their loved one, closely followed by emotional support, the volunteer spending time with them, and the volunteer providing them with information. Family members rated volunteers highly on a list of qualities/characteristics that exemplify individuals who are effective in this role. In all, 85% of the family members felt that their volunteer was well trained and 95% did not feel that their or their loved one’s privacy had been invaded by having a volunteer. Overall, family members were very satisfied with the volunteer support they received. Some limitations of the study are discussed.

Some Common Problems Faced by Hospice Palliative Care Volunteers

This paper examines 4 common problems that many hospice palliative care volunteers in Canada (and the United States) encounter, namely, being underutilized, being placed with a patient too late in the patients illness, feeling undervalued by some members of the medical staff, and not being able to do more to help patients and their families. The implications of each of these problems are discussed along with suggestions for overcoming them. Finally, some ideas for future research are proposed.

Understanding of the term “palliative care”: A Canadian survey:

This article examines the results of two studies conducted in Atlantic Canada to evaluate people’s understanding of palliative care. In Study 1, a sample of adults were asked to respond to a brief survey. Respondents were asked if they had ever heard of palliative care. Those who answered “yes” were asked to respond to a number of additional questions about palliative care. The results of Study 1 revealed that over three-quarters of the respondents (75.3 percent) had heard of palliative care, however, only about half of these (48.4 percent) defined it as care for terminally ill or dying persons. Of those who had heard of palliative care, the vast majority (92.3 percent) said they would use palliative care services if they had a terminally ill family member. In Study 2, respondents were presented with a written description of palliative care. After reading the description, respondents were asked to indicate whether or not they knew (prior to reading the description) what palliative care was. Those who answered “yes” were asked to provide a written explanation of how they first learned about palliative care; those who answered “no” were asked to provide written suggestions of how they believed information about palliative care should be disseminated to the public. The results revealed that 60.5 percent of the respondents knew about palliative care before reading the description. Of those who knew about palliative care, 40.8 percent of them first learned about it through personal experience with the death of a family member or close friend. Of those who did not know what palliative care was, the suggestions they gave for creating community awareness of palliative care included: information disseminated by healthcare providers, use of pamphlets, the media, and the church.

The inventory of motivations for hospice palliative care volunteerism: a tool for recruitment and retention.

Given the essential role of volunteers in hospice palliative care, it would be beneficial to have a recruitment and retention tool that is reliable and valid. To address this gap, the current investigation sought to adapt and extend the Inventory of Motivations for Palliative Care Volunteerism (IMPCV) of Claxton-Oldfield, Jefferies, Fawcett, Wasylkiw, and Claxton-Oldfield.1 The purpose of study 1 was to address methodological concerns of the IMPCV using 141 undergraduate students. After conceptually relevant items were added to the IMPCV, participants indicated the degree of influence each of the motivations would have on their, and another person’s, decision to become a hospice palliative care volunteer. In both cases, 5 internally consistent subscales were identified through principal components analysis: altruism, civic responsibility, self-promotion, leisure, and personal gain. Convergent and discriminant validity were demonstrated using an established measure of empathy. In study 2, 141 hospice palliative care volunteers completed the revised and renamed Inventory of Motivations for Hospice Palliative Care Volunteerism (IMHPCV). Confirmatory factor analysis provided support for the 5-factor structure of the IMHPCV. The authors encourage other researchers to use the IMHPCV as a measurement tool in studying the motivations of hospice palliative care volunteers.

A Study of the Motivations of British Hospice Volunteers

In all, 162 British hospice volunteers completed the Inventory of Motivations for Hospice Palliative Care Volunteerism (IMHPCV) of Claxton-Oldfield, Wasylkiw, Mark, and Claxton-Oldfield.1 The IMHPCV taps into 5 different categories of motives for becoming a hospice palliative care volunteer: altruism, civic responsibility, leisure, self-promotion, and personal gain. Altruistic motives were the most influential reasons for choosing to join hospice; personal gain motives were the least influential reasons for becoming a hospice volunteer. Altruistic motives were found to be a significant predictor of volunteers’ length of service to the hospice. Compared to previously collected data from a sample of Canadian hospice palliative care volunteers,1 the current study’s sample of British hospice volunteers scored significantly different on 2 of the 5 categories of motives on the IMHPCV.

Should I Stay or Should I Go A Study of Hospice Palliative Care Volunteer Satisfaction and Retention

Forty-one hospice palliative care volunteers (from 6 community- and 3 hospital-based programs) participated in informal group discussions regarding (1) what aspects of their work provide them with the most (and least) satisfaction; (2) why they continue to volunteer; and (3) why they might stop. In 5 of the 9 programs, volunteers said that feeling appreciated by the patients/families they support gave them great satisfaction. Boundary issues and/or role ambiguities were among the least satisfying aspects of their work, mentioned by volunteers in 4 programs. Volunteers in all 9 programs mentioned that they continue to volunteer because it makes a difference/helps others/meets a need in other people’s lives. Among the reasons given for potentially stopping volunteering were a family crisis, burnout, old age, and other commitments.

Palliative care volunteerism among college students in Canada

The goal of Study 1 was to investigate whether young Canadian adults were interested in becoming involved in palliative care volunteer work. After reading a brief description of what volunteering in a palliative care environment typically involves, participants (undergraduate students) were asked to indicate whether they would be interested in this kind of volunteer experience and to provide a written explanation of their answer. Of the 105 participating students, only 39 (37.1 percent) expressed an interest in volunteering, while 66 (62.9 percent) were not interested. Not surprisingly, the results revealed that significantly more females than males were interested in palliative care volunteer work (45.9 percent and 25.0 percent, respectively). The most common reason students gave for wanting to become a palliative care volunteer was to help others; the reason given most often for not wanting to volunteer was that it would be too emotionally demanding. It is important to note that prior to taking part in this study the majority of the participating students (75.9 percent) did not know what palliative care was. The goal of Study 2 was to investigate undergraduate students’ interest in volunteering in a nursing home, in a classroom, and at a food bank. Of the 111 participating students, 74 (66.7 percent) expressed an interest in volunteering at a food bank and in a nursing home, and 89 (80.2 percent) were interested in becoming a classroom volunteer. Together, the results of Studies 1 and 2 support the view that young people in Canada (especially males) are not interested in becoming involved in the care of dying persons. However, the results also indicate that they are very interested in volunteering with other populations (e.g., the elderly, school children) and in other settings (e.g., food bank).

What Palliative Care Volunteers Would Like to Know About the Patients They Are Being Asked to Support

A study was conducted to determine the kind of information palliative care volunteers would like to know about the patients they are being asked to support before they actually meet with them for the first time. Thirty-one palliative care volunteers responded to a brief questionnaire, developed for this study. At least half of the volunteers indicated that their coordinator provided them with the following patient information: (1) the patient’s support system/family circumstances (eg, if there is any family),(2) the patient’s diagnosis/disease, (3) the patient’s age, and (4) the patient’s location (address/room number). Overall, the volunteers were very satisfied with the information their coordinators passed along to them. Volunteers rated medical information (eg, the patient’s diagnosis) and relationship information (eg, the patient’s marital status) as being more important to them than personal information (eg, the patient’s interests and hobbies). The 3 most important sources of patient information, mentioned by at least half of the volunteers, were (1) their coordinator, (2) the patient’s family members, and (3) the patient himself or herself. Only a few volunteers described issues around confidentiality that had arisen in their work (eg, being a volunteer in a small town, where people know what you are doing).

How to Attract More Males to Community-Based Hospice Palliative Care Volunteer Programs

Two separate studies were conducted to better understand why so few middle-aged and older men volunteer in hospice palliative care; only about 10% of the patient/family care volunteers in New Brunswick’s community-based hospice palliative care volunteer programs are men. In study 1, 15 (22%) of the 68 men who read a brief description about the kinds of things that hospice palliative care volunteers do expressed an interest in this type of volunteerism. The main reasons given for their lack of interest included ‘‘being too busy’’ and ‘‘not being able to handle it emotionally.’’ At least one third of the men who said ‘‘No’’ to becoming a hospice palliative care volunteer expressed an interest in 10 of 13 other common volunteer activities (eg, driving). In study 2, 59 men were presented with a list of 25 tasks that hospice palliative care volunteers might perform when providing emotional, social, practical, and administrative support. The men were asked to indicate which tasks they would be willing to perform if they were a hospice palliative care volunteer. The men were least willing to serve on the board of directors (28%), provide hands on patient care (38%), and work in the volunteer program’s office (42%); they were most willing to talk to the patient (97%), share hobbies and interests with the patient (92%), listen to the patient’s memories and life stories (90%), and provide friendship and companionship (88%). The results of these studies may have implications for the recruitment of male volunteers to work with dying patients and their families.

Some Possible Implications of Negative Stepfather Stereotypes

Abstract Two studies were conducted to investigate whether ambiguous evidence of child abuse would lead undergraduate students to be more suspicious of stepfathers than of fathers. In Study 1, students responded to a written vignette in which a 15 year old girl mentions to a high school counsellor that her stepfather (or father) likes to tickle her unexpectedly at home. Imagining themselves as the counsellor at the girls school, students rated the stepfathers behaviour as more suspicious than the same behaviour by a father. In addition, the tickling of the 15 year old girl was more likely to be regarded as inappropriate, disrespectful, unwanted, or possibly abusive when it was done by a stepfather rather than by a father. In Study 2, students responded to a written vignette describing a young boys visit to a hospital after twisting his ankle and hitting his head in a soccer game. During the examination, bruises are revealed on the boys back and arms, which the boy says he got playing soccer. Imagining themselves as the doctor at the hospital, students were no more likely to be suspicious of the bruises when the boy was believed to be from a stepfather family than from a biological family. It may be that the stereotype of stepfathers as being sexually abusive is stronger than the stereotype of stepfathers as being physically abusive. The possible implications of these results are discussed.