Exploring the Rehabilitation and Educational Needs of Individuals with a Previous Diagnosis of Sepsis and Cancer

Research Objectives: To 1) examine the rehabilitation related experiences and barriers to rehabilitation for individuals with a history of sepsis and cancer, their caregivers, and the healthcare team, and 2) explore patient, caregiver, and health professional needs for educational resources related to rehabilitation.

Design: We performed a qualitative descriptive study using interview and focus group methodology.

Setting: Participants were recruited from the community.

Participants: Thirty participants were included in this study. Included participants were: (1) greater than 18 years of age, (2) living in Canada, (3) able to understand English, (4) currently or previously diagnosed with sepsis as an adult and treated in hospital and previously diagnosed with cancer in adulthood (any type, stage, treatment status, or time since treatment) or were a caregiver of someone with a current or past diagnosis of sepsis and cancer or were a healthcare professional working with individuals with sepsis and cancer as part of their routine practice.

Interventions: We undertook this study as part of the larger “ICaRe” project; an experience-based co-design (EBCD) project aiming to explore the intersection of cancer, sepsis, and frailty, and improve educational tools describing the benefit of rehabilitation for these populations. EBCD in an approach involving multiple collaborators, including patients, caregivers, and health practitioners, sharing experiences at multiple stages during the design and implementation process of products and services. We recorded interviews and focus groups which were transcribed verbatim. Transcripts were uploaded into NVivo software.

Main Outcome Measures: Two reviewers analyzed the interview and focus group transcripts using qualitative content analysis. We used independent line-by-line analysis to generate initial codes and consensus to finalize and develop the definitions for codes. The codes were then grouped and consolidated into categories.

Results: We identified three overarching themes relating to rehabilitation: 1) the rehabilitation experience did not meet the patient’s care expectations; 2) barriers to rehabilitation exist on multiple levels, and 3) there are important gaps in education on how to improve physical and psychosocial outcomes. We identified two themes related to educational resources: 1) educational content provided must be specific and meaningful, and 2) multi-modal resources are needed to suit diverse partner needs.

Conclusions: We identified rehabilitation barriers related to healthcare settings, the pandemic, and workplace culture in the care of those with a history of cancer and sepsis. This study highlights the need to create diverse educational resources for multiple partners focusing on rehabilitation for those with cancer and sepsis to improve outcomes and patient/caregiver satisfaction in this population.

Author(s) Disclosures: None.