Keywords
social support
coping
psychological distress
family caregivers
palliative care
How to Cite
Abstract
Background: Family caregivers sustain much of the day-to-day work of palliative care, yet their psychological needs may remain insufficiently visible in settings where specialist services, respite, and transport are constrained. This study examined psychological distress, coping strategies, and perceived social support among caregivers of palliative-care patients in a study identified as involving tribal communities.
Methods: A quantitative cross-sectional analysis was conducted on 60 caregiver records. Depression, anxiety, and stress were represented by the 21-item Depression Anxiety Stress Scales (DASS-21); coping by the 14 two-item Brief COPE dimensions; and perceived social support by the Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support (MSPSS). Descriptive statistics, internal-consistency estimates, Pearson and Spearman correlations, group comparisons, and parsimonious multiple regressions were used.
Results: Mean doubled DASS-21 scores were 25.37 for depression, 24.77 for anxiety, and 26.90 for stress. Perceived social support correlated inversely with depression (r = -.522), anxiety (r = -.484), and stress (r = -.474), all p < .001. Denial, behavioural disengagement, venting, and self-blame were positively associated with distress, whereas active coping, positive reframing, acceptance, and religious coping generally showed inverse associations. Models containing perceived support, denial, active coping, and self-blame explained 60.2% of depression variance, 57.1% of anxiety variance, and 61.9% of stress variance. Most demographic and caregiving group comparisons were nonsignificant.
Conclusions: Caregiver distress in this sample was more consistently related to perceived psychosocial resources and coping patterns than to broad demographic categories. Family-centred palliative care should include caregiver psychological assessment, context-sensitive support mobilisation, and coping-focused interventions. Findings are correlational and require replication in larger, longitudinal, culturally documented samples.
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