Abstract:
This descriptive correlational study was conducted to describe fatigue of family caregivers taking care of end-stage renal disease (ERSD) patients with hemodialysis. The purpose of the study was accomplished by examining the relationships among health status, caregiving burden, social support, and fatigue in family caregivers of ESRD patients. The conceptual framework guiding the study was derived from Pugh and Milligans theory of unpleasant symptoms. The purposive sample consisted of 78 family caregivers of patients receiving hemodialysis at 4 hospitals in Bangkok, Thailand from May to August 2008. Instruments used in this study were: the demographic data questionnaire, Health Status Scale, Caregiving Burden Scale, Social Support questionnaire and the Modified Fatigue Symptom Checklist. Descriptive statistics, Pearsons product moment correlation coefficient, and multiple regression analysis were used to analyze the data. The Results of the study indicated that the sample had moderate fatigue with a mean of 50.20. Good health status was negatively related to fatigue (r = -.545, p < .01). High caregiving burden were positively related to fatigue (r = .454, p < .01). Social support was not related to fatigue (r = -.010, p = .932). In addition, health status, caregiving burden and social support were found to be predictors of fatigue in caregivers and accounted for 35 percent of the variance of fatigue (F 3,74 = 13.590, p < .05), Of these, health status was the best predictor. A nurse, as a health care professional, should assess health status, caregiving burden, and social support in order to design programs to decrease fatigue in caregivers effectively.