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The lack of choice and predominance of crisis-oriented care in relation to respite and long-term care for family carers and frail older people provided the authors with the rationale for the development, within the European-funded Assisting Carers using Telematic Interventions to meet Older person's Needs (ACTION) project, of two innovative multimedia programs. The key aim of the programs is to provide education, information, and support about respite care and planning for the future for family carers and frail older people in their homes. In this way, it is intended that family carers and frail older people will be able to make informed choices concerning their health and social care needs. The authors describe the conceptual basis of the multimedia programs, the research and development process, the content of the multimedia programs, and the evaluation of the developed product.

This paper provides a concept analysis of respite care for frail older people and their family carers. The authors re-examine the broader conceptualization of respite care delineated by Nolan & Grant, namely, users' needs for information, education and support about respite care, based on a review of recent literature and on a user focus group study. This work was undertaken by the Sheffield arm of the ACTION Project research team. ACTION is a 36-month project (1997-1999), involving Northern Ireland, The Republic of Ireland, Portugal, Sweden and England and is the largest nurse-led project to have received funding from the European Union TIDE sector (DGXIII Telematics Applications Programme, Disabled and Elderly). The authors discuss the key elements of respite and, more specifically, how they can be successfully used so that the potential of respite may be realized fully by family carers. Recommendations within the context of the ACTION research project are put forward to enable family carers and the persons they care for to make informed choices about respite care.

In-depth interviews with a sample of 10 nurses working permanent night duty in a British regional oncology and radiotherapy hospital reported that a significant part of their job involved psychological support for those patients who were awake and experiencing stress. The respondents explained that this psychological work was often disregarded and/or went unrecognized by the nursing staff on day duty, an attitude that could jeopardize the continuity of care of cancer patients. The findings stem from the author's doctoral dissertation concerning the role of the cancer nurse in relation to stress and the person with cancer, and they lay the foundation for further studies into the nature of the nurse's support role of cancer patients at night and in different health-care settings.