Motivations for providing care in family caregivers of hemodialysis patients: A qualitative content analysis study

There is little knowledge about the underlying motivations that cause caregivers to care for the patient or not. This study aimed to identify the motivations of providing care in family caregivers of hemodialysis patients

This qualitative study was conducted using the conventional content analysis method. Fifteen family caregivers of hemodialysis patients were enrolled in the study via purposive with a maximum variation sampling method. The setting was hemodialysis wards of Tehran teaching hospitals. Data were collected via semi-structured interviews. The analysis was performed using conventional content analysis with MAXQDA version 10. To ensure the trustworthiness of the data, the criteria of Credibility, Dependability, Transferability, and Confirmability were taken into account

Fifteen participants (eight women and three men) were interviewed. The majority (eight of them) were spouses. Totally 200 codes, 12 subcategories, four generic categories, and two main categories were extracted. The main categories included Social Motivation (including two generic categories: providing care influenced by norms and culture and providing care inspired by social influence) and Internal motivation (including two generic categories: religious-spiritual motivation to provide care and emotional-moral motivation to provide care).

To benefit from the valuable capabilities of family caregivers, must pay attention to their social and internal motivations in providing care.  The findings of this study can be helpful for future planning to strengthen internal motivations and improve and guide the external motivations of caregivers.