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Family and friend caregivers play critical roles in ensuring that persons with serious illness receive high-quality care, and their responsibilities often increase as patients transition from receiving solely curative-focused care to primarily palliative-focused care. Integrating family caregivers into the health care team and supporting them in their role has significant benefits for family caregivers, patients, health care systems, communities, and society. Palliative care clinicians across all disciplines are uniquely suited to provide necessary training and support to family caregivers as they navigate the demands of their role. Here, we contend that providing comprehensive palliative care includes addressing the needs of family caregivers and provide ten tips and practical guidance to assist palliative care clinicians to support family caregivers. Engaging family caregivers as partners in care will ultimately allow palliative care clinicians to deliver the highest quality patient care and ensure the best possible outcomes for families facing serious illnesses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objective: Caregivers are critical in advanced care planning (ACP) discussions, which are difficult but necessary to carry out patients' goals of care. We developed and evaluated the feasibility and acceptability of a communication training to equip caregivers of patients with malignant brain tumors with skills to navigate ACP conversations. Method: Caregivers completed a 2-h virtual training addressing ACP Discussions with Your Loved One and ACP Discussions with the Medical Team. A pre-training assessment was completed at baseline and a training evaluation was completed one day post-training. A subset of participants completed semi-structured interviews 2 months post-training. Results: Of 15 caregivers recruited, 9 attended the training and 4 completed qualitative interviews. Post-training, 40% felt confident in discussing ACP with loved ones and 67% felt confident doing so with healthcare professionals; 100% reported feeling confident in using skills learned in the training to facilitate these conversations. Data from qualitative interviews highlighted additional benefits of the training in empathic communication skills and fostering social support. Significance of results: Our communication skills training shows promise in supporting caregivers' skills and confidence in engaging in ACP discussions with patients and healthcare providers. A future randomized controlled trial with a larger and more diverse caregiving sample is needed to determine training efficacy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Family and friend caregivers play a critical role in advance care planning (ACP) discussions, which are difficult but necessary to carry out patients' goals of care. This role is particularly important among caregivers of patients with malignant gliomas (MGs), who are often tasked with quickly taking responsibility for healthcare communication. We developed and evaluated the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effects of a virtual communication training program to equip caregivers of patients with recurrent MGs with skills to navigate ACP conversations with patients and healthcare providers., Methods: Our two-hour communication skills training combined a series of didactic exercises with role-play scenarios, as well as follow-up coaching via a booster call conducted two-weeks after training completion. Caregivers were randomized to receive either the Communication Skills Training or Enhanced Usual Care (EUC), which included screening and the provision of targeted referrals. Assessments were completed at baseline (T1) and at two- (T2) and five-months (T3) follow-up., Results: Thirty-four caregivers enrolled and were randomized, of whom 19 completed the T2 and 18 completed the T3 assessment. Ten of the 13 caregivers who completed the training participated in interviews at T2 about their experiences and perceived benefits of participation. At T3, results indicated a strong effect size for reduced anxiety and distress, and increased preparedness for death in caregivers who received the intervention relative to EUC. Participants reported the training helped them feel confident initiating ACP conversations, validated in their fears about death, and helped them feel supported and less alone., Conclusion: Despite the challenges of recruiting a highly distressed group of caregivers, there were notable benefits of our Communication Skills Training. Additional larger trials are needed to rigorously evaluate the efficacy of the training program and those that include caregivers of patients with other sites and stages of cancer to determine the generalizability of findings.