Reimagining a Care Partner Program to Improve Family Engagement During Critical Illness
Background
Care partners are individuals chosen by a person with an illness to support their care during hospitalization. In settings such as long-term care, Care Partners programs improve family engagement and patient outcomes. Despite knowledge that family engagement is critical to patient recovery during and following intensive care unit (ICU) admission, Care Partner programs specifically for the ICU setting have not yet been designed or evaluated.
Project
This multiple stage project has the overall aim of using community participatory methods including co-design and evaluate Care Partner programs for ICU clinical settings- structurally embedding a family engagement program to improve equitable access to supports and services.
This first stage of this project was a qualitative descriptive study exploring reported roles of care partners, the impact of care provision during persistent critical illness, and barriers to and facilitators for implementing a care partner program in this setting from the perspectives of patients, carers, and health care providers.
The second stage will use community-based co-design methods to create a toolkit for Care Partner program implementation in these settings.
Finally, we will evaluate the acceptability and impact of Care Partner programs on patient, family, and formal care team outcomes.
Research Team
- Dr. Laura Istanboulian, Assistant Professor, Lawerence Bloomberg, Faculty of Nursing, University of Toronto ; Michael Garron Hospital, Canada
- A. Gilding, Michael Garron Hospital, Toronto East Health Network, ON, Canada
- L. Hamilton, Michael Garron Hospital, Toronto East Health Network, ON, Canada
- Dr. K. Smith, Institute of Health Policy, Management, & Evaluation, Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto; Michael Garron Hospital,Toronto East Health Network, ON, Canada
- Dr. Karen Soldatić, Canada Excellence Research Chair in Health Equity and Community Wellbeing, Toronto Metropolitan University, ON, Canada
Funding
- This work is funded in part by the Michael Garron Hospital TD Health Community Solutions Fund, the Michael Garron Hospital Foundation, and Seed Funding from Faculty of Community Services at Toronto Metropolitan University. Additional support has been provided by the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Health Equity & Community Wellbeing research program.
Period
- 2023 - Ongoing
Publications
1. Istanboulian, L., Gilding, A., Hamilton, L., Master, T., Bingler, S., Soldatić, K, & Smith, K.M. (Submitted June 26, 2024). Reported impact and protective factors of the care partner role during persistent critical illness. BMC Nursing.
2. Istanboulian, L., Gilding, A., Hamilton, L., Master, T., Bingler S., Hill, M. 2, Isani, S., Kazi, S. , Coppinger, S., & Smith, K. (Submitted May 27, 2024). Reported roles of care partners in a specialized weaning centre – Perspectives of patients, care partners, and health care providers. Frontiers in Health Care.