Evidence-Based Practices

The practices or interventions included in this section followed an explicit, carefully documented process and produced significant results on caregiver outcome variables (e.g. lowered caregiver depression, introduced novel coping skills etc) or offered valuable insight into some aspect of family caregiving. These interventions were selected after careful review of the literature and were further discussed with experts in the field. In addition, the following apply to the selected practices:

1. Articles were published after 1990
2. Care receiver is an adult with adult onset chronic and disabling health conditions
3. Articles either report on a single intervention or is a meta analysis of a cluster of interventions (original study may date prior to 1990)
4. Interventions studied are either caregiver specific or contain a significant caregiver component
5. Studies provide adequate information on methodology (including materials/scales used) so that they can be replicated accurately
6. Report provides credible evidence for the intervention’s effectiveness