The experiences of family caregivers living with breast cancer patients in low-and middle-income countries: A systematic review
Kusi, Grace, Boamah Mensah, Adwoa Bemah, Boamah Mensah, Kofi, Dzomeku, Veronica Millicent, Apiribu, Felix, Duodu, Precious Adade, Adamu, Bakinam, Agbadi, Pascal, and Bonsu, Kwadwo Osei (2020) The experiences of family caregivers living with breast cancer patients in low-and middle-income countries: A systematic review. Systematic Reviews, 9 (1). 165.
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Abstract
Introduction: Caregivers of women with breast cancer in low-and-middle-income countries experience significant physical and economic burdens. The review aimed to map the evidence of studies that had reported on the experiences of family caregivers of women diagnosed with breast cancer.
Methods: A systematic literature search was conducted in CINAHL, PubMed, PsycINFO, Scopus, and Web of Science databases using a combination of key search terms and medical subject heading terms such as “family caregiver,” “breast cancer,” “home care,” “low-and-middle-income countries,” “experience,” “effect,” and “coping mechanism.” A total of 1781 articles were retrieved and screened. Nineteen studies addressing caregiving experiences were included in the final review based on the inclusion and exclusion criteria.
Results: The systematic review yielded 19 studies that focused on caregivers’ motivation, needs of caregivers, intervention for caregivers, and consequences of caregiving. The most significant correlates of the quality of life among caregivers were disease severity, functional status of patients, and family income. The challenges encountered by caregivers were mostly psychosocial.
Conclusions: Caregivers play a crucial role in the management of women with breast cancer. However, they are faced with increasing challenges in their caregiving roles. Understanding the nature and extent of the burden experienced by family caregivers in developing countries will facilitate the development of appropriate interventions that can help improve caregivers’ quality of life. Gaps in recent studies were identified, and suggestions for future research were also addressed in this review.
| Item ID: | 88973 |
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| Item Type: | Article (Research - C1) |
| ISSN: | 2046-4053 |
| Keywords: | Breast cancer, Experiences, Family caregiver, Low- and middle-income countries |
| Copyright Information: | © 2020 The Author(s). This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. |
| Date Deposited: | 26 Sep 2025 02:05 |
| FoR Codes: | 42 HEALTH SCIENCES > 4206 Public health > 420606 Social determinants of health @ 50% 44 HUMAN SOCIETY > 4409 Social work > 440999 Social work not elsewhere classified @ 50% |
| SEO Codes: | 20 HEALTH > 2004 Public health (excl. specific population health) > 200401 Behaviour and health @ 100% |
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