Objective: To compare caregiving received and quality of life of children suffering from cancer as perceived by the children and the caregivers, and to identify factors influencing quality of life of the children.
Material and Methods: Purposive sampling was used to select 160 caregivers and 160 children with cancer at the pediatric outpatient departments and pediatric wards of three hospitals in southern Thailand. The inclusion criteria included children with cancer receiving at least one course of chemotherapy, ability to communicate well in the Thai language and willingness to cooperate. Data were collected using three questionnaires: 1) demographic and influencing factors, 2) caring behavior, and 3) the quality of life. The questionnaires were tested for content validity and for the reliability of questionnaires 2-3, yielding Cronbach’s alpha coefficients of 0.87 and 0.93, respectively for children and 0.85 and 0.90, respectively for caregivers.
Results: The mean total scores of caring behavior and quality of life perceived by children and caregivers were at a high level. Mean total score of caregivers’ caring behavior was higher than that of children (t=-5.195, p=0.000). No significant difference of mean total scores of quality of life was found when comparing between children and caregivers (t=1.681, p=0.094). Approximately 15.5 percent of the variance of quality of life perceived by caregivers could be explained by caring behavior, child's age, and caregivers’ education [(F3, 153)=10.57, p=0.000]. Approximately 12.3 percent of the variance of quality of life perceived by the children could be explained by caring behavior and child's education [(F2, 157)=10.57, p=0.000].
Conclusion: To provide effective nursing care to enhance the quality of life of cancer-stricken children, nurses should always carefully consider a significant difference of mean total scores of caring behavior when comparing between children and caregivers and also some factors influencing on perceived quality of life by children especially caring behavior and their education as well as their caregivers such as caring behavior, child’s age and caregivers’ education.