UMSN’s Dr. Laurel Northouse: A Career Focused on Caregivers and Cancer Patients
Dr. Northouse’s research is featured in Oncology Nursing News.
“We often focus on the quality of care provided in the hospital but seldom examine the quality of care in the home where people spend the majority of their time recovering from cancer treatments,” says University of Michigan School of Nursing Professor Emerita Laurel Northouse PhD, RN, FAAN.
At age 27, Dr. Northouse became a caregiver when her husband was diagnosed with Stage IV Hodgkin’s Disease. He's doing well today, but the diagnosis inspired decades of research focusing on caregivers of cancer patients. “Many family caregivers feel unprepared to give the care we expect from them,” says Dr. Northouse. “We need to include family members in programs of care and provide them with information and support so they can provide high quality care in the home, without compromising their own health.” A hallmark of Dr. Northouse’s work is the integrated focus on the patient-caregiver “dyad” as a unit of care.
Dr. Northouse’s efforts, including the development of the FOCUS program (Family, Optimism, Coping, Uncertainty, and Symptoms), are featured in Oncology Nursing News. FOCUS is an intervention designed to help both cancer patients and their caregivers with coping, communication and quality of life.
While Dr. Northouse has recently retired from UMSN, she remains involved and dedicated to increasing research and support for caregivers. “We know from many research studies that family caregivers are affected by the patient’s illness,” she says. “It is time to address the needs of caregivers in a systematic way. It cannot be left to chance.”
The FOCUS program will continue to be offered to cancer patients and their family caregivers at the Cancer Support Community in Ann Arbor. In the future, Northouse and clinicians at the Cancer Support Community are hoping to offer the program at other Cancer Support Communities so that more patients and caregivers can benefit from it.
