Thai family caregivers' experiences helping dependent elders during medical emergencies: a qualitative study

To describe the experience of family caregivers of dependent elders during medical emergencies in rural settings in Thailand.

This was a descriptive qualitative research using in-depth interviews of 15 participants. Content analysis was applied to transcribed interviews, including data reduction as well as identification of key words, phrases, and themes.

The findings described the experience of caregivers of dependent older persons who faced emergency illness. Most of the family caregivers described their roles in unusual situations as practising assessment first and doing something that may relieve the symptoms experienced by the older persons before initiating and calling for help from relatives, neighbors, and, finally, the emergency medical services. The caregivers four main barriers to them feeling competent: (1) lack of home monitoring devices, (2) inexperienced caregivers in assessing warning signs to report during emergency care, (3) lack of information and understanding of patient rights in emergency health services, and (4) delayed arrival of emergency medical services.

There are barriers to the development of competency in caregiving skills, especially in assessing and recognizing warning signs and initiating first aid accurately before the arrival of the emergency health care team.