Support Care Needs among Patients with Cancer Attending Palliative Care Clinic in Meru Level5 Hospital, Meru County, Kenya

Abstract

Patients with cancer experience numerous negative impacts due to the nature of the disease. This leads to poor quality of life and need for support care. The aim of this study was to establish the supportive care needs among patients with cancer attending palliative care clinic in Meru level 5 Hospital. The study used descriptive cross-sectional design that adopted qualitative approach in data collection. Purposive sampling method was used to select the respondents. A total of twenty-four respondents participated in the study, twenty-one of the respondents were patients with cancer while were key informants working in palliative clinic. A focus group discussion guide was used to modulate focused group discussions while interview schedule was used for individualized interview. Two sets of individualized interviews were conducted, one for the three key informants and another one for the patients. Individualized interviews were done till when no new information was forthcoming from subsequent interviews and when further coding was not feasible hence redundancy. Two focused group discussions were conducted, (one for male patients and another one for female patients). All interviews were recorded and transcribed. The study employed thematic qualitative data analysis where processing and analysis of the data was done manually. Descriptive analysis was computed to analyze quantitative data on the respondents’ socio-demographic characteristics and presented in form of tables. Qualitative results were presented in narrative with selected compelling exemplar quotes from the interview. The study revealed support care needs are felt in a wide spectrum which includes socio-economic needs such as high cost of treatment, NHIF challenges, long distances to the facility, poor road networks, accommodation challenges, stock out of medication and inadequate infrastructure. Psychological needs are stigma, anxiety, fear, anger, low self-esteem, hopelessness and depression. Informational care needs on diagnosis, treatment, side effects and prognosis. All participants had financial constraints throughout the cancer trajectory due to out-of-pocket expenses. In conclusion it was evident from the findings that cancer patients have a range of supportive care needs in various domains which include financial, psychological, informational and social domains. Therefore, to address the supportive care needs mobilization of resources and formulation of policies will be of paramount importance.