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Health Communication, 28: 110–118, 2013
Copyright © Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
ISSN: 1041-0236 print / 1532-7027 online
DOI: 10.1080/10410236.2011.652935

Family Caregiver Participation in Hospice Interdisciplinary Team
Meetings: How Does It Affect the Nature and Content of

Communication?

Elaine Wittenberg-Lyles
Markey Cancer Center and Department of Communication

University of Kentucky

Debra Parker Oliver and Robin L. Kruse
Curtis W. and Ann H. Long Department of Family and Community Medicine

University of Missouri

George Demiris
School of Nursing and School of Medicine

University of Washington

L. Ashley Gage
School of Social Work
University of Missouri

Ken Wagner
Department of Communication Studies

University of North Texas

Collaboration between family caregivers and health care providers is necessary to ensure
patient-centered care, especially for hospice patients. During hospice care, interdisciplinary
team members meet biweekly to collaborate and develop holistic care plans that address the
physical, spiritual, psychological, and social needs of patients and families. The purpose of
this study was to explore team communication when video-conferencing is used to facilitate
the family caregiver’s participation in a hospice team meeting. Video-recorded team meetings
with and without family caregiver participation were analyzed for communication patterns
using the Roter Interaction Analysis System. Standard meetings that did not include caregivers
were shorter in duration and task-focused, with little participation from social workers and
chaplains. Meetings that included caregivers revealed an emphasis on biomedical education
and relationship-building between participants, little psychosocial counseling, and increased
socioemotional talk from social workers and chaplains. Implications for family participation
in hospice team meetings are highlighted.

Correspondence should be addressed to Elaine Wittenberg-Lyles, University of Kentucky, Markey Cancer Center and Department of Communication,
741 S. Limestone, B357 BBSRB, Lexington, KY 40506-0509. E-mail: Elaine.lyles@uky.edu

HOSPICE FAMILY CAREGIVERS 111

Hospice care is provided to both the patient and family,
and includes attention to the physical, psychological,
spiritual, and emotional needs of the dying and their
loved ones (Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services,
2008). Physicians, patients, families, and other health care
providers agree that preparation for the end of life includes
ensuring that the family is prepared for the loved one’s
death (Steinhauser et al., 2001). Family members are most
satisfied with hospice services when they are informed
regularly and receive social support from staff (Rhodes,
Mitchell, Miller, Connor, & Teno, 2008). Family members
also feel satisfied with hospice services when they are
informed about their loved one’s condition on a regular
basis, feel that the team provides them social support, and
are able to identify one nurse as being in charge of the
patient’s care (Rhodes et al., 2008).

However, communication between family caregivers and
providers continues to be problematic (Bowman, Rose,
Radziewicz, O’Toole, & Berila, 2009). Caregivers report that
they need more information, more support, and increased
communication with staff (Dougherty, 2010). Bereaved
caregivers of long-term care patients reported that they
did not receive enough information when their loved one
was dying, that they did not understand what the clin-
ician had told them about what to expect, and that the
physician did not always discuss the patient’s end-of-life
wishes (Biola et al., 2007). Hospice providers report that
communication with caregivers can be difficult due to the
caregiver’s impaired concentration, the caregiver’s propen-
sity to engage in silence, the caregiver’s desire not to
bother clinicians, the caregiver’s rejection of support ser-
vices, and timing and amount of information received dur-
ing an encounter (Hudson, Aranda, & Kristjanson, 2004).
Inadequacies in communication with caregivers can also
result from interdisciplinary relationships among team mem-
bers that emerge from turf-type issues, the inability of the
team to provide a common message to the patient/family,
and inefficient communication processes within the care sys-
tem (Kirk, Kirk, Kuziemsky, & Wagar, 2010). This study
investigated ACTIVE team meetings, when one or more
family members virtually participate in team meetings, to
examine how caregiver participation in interdisciplinary
team meetings affected team communication with family
caregivers.

INTERDISCIPLINARY TEAMS AND
PATIENT-CENTERED CARE

The theoretical framework for this study combines a model
for the participation of family on healthcare teams and
interdisciplinary collaboration, an approach called ACTIVE:
Assessing Caregivers for Team Intervention through Video
Encounters (Parker Oliver, Demiris, Wittenberg-Lyles,
& Porock, 2010). Similar to the input–process–output

framework detailed by Real and Poole (2011)—which
considers communication structures that shape commu-
nication processes and how these processes influence
health care outcomes—the ACTIVE framework combines
a model of interdisciplinary collaboration that includes
families proposed by Saltz and Schaefer (1996) and
incorporates Bronstein (2003), who identified important
components to the team process that impact successful
collaboration.

According to Saltz and Schaefer (1996), the model inter-
disciplinary team enacts patient-centered care by includ-
ing the patient and family as core members of the health
care team. Team structures determine whether family mem-
bers are viewed as “lay” team members (without detailed
knowledge) or “specialists” (with a tremendous amount of
knowledge regarding the patient). Bronstein (2003) further
details team processes by providing an outline for suc-
cessful collaboration between hospice staff members. The
framework identifies four components to interdisciplinary
collaboration processes: (1) interdependence and flexibility;
(2) newly created professional activities; (3) collective own-
ership of goals; and (4) reflection on process. Bronstein’s
model for interdisciplinary collaboration when combined
with the work of Saltz and Schaefer (1996) supports inclu-
sion of patients and family, as the team will become inter-
dependent with patient/family goals and will create new
activities and roles for patients/families within the team,
requiring flexibility among individual members’ role def-
initions. The patient/family involvement will require col-
lective ownership of all goals by all team members, and
the care outcomes will be evaluated through a reflection on
the team process, again including feedback from patients/
families.

The Role of Telemedicine in Interdisciplinary Team
Communication

Telemedicine tools, such as advanced communication tech-
nology, offer the potential to improve team communication
and collaboration by facilitating caregiver involvement in
team meetings. Attendance and participation in team meet-
ings are problematic for many hospice caregivers due to the
care needs of the patient, geographic distance and travel to
the hospice office, confidentiality issues as people wait in
the office, and the time involved for team members (Parker
Oliver, Porock, Demiris, & Courtney, 2005). Consequently,
family caregivers are rarely included in hospice team meet-
ings. ACTIVE team meetings offer caregivers the opportu-
nity to utilize video-conferencing technology to participate
in hospice interdisciplinary team meetings and overcome
barriers to participation.

Previous research on telemedicine interactions has
included family members, but little is known about their
participation. One study found that while family members
participated in 48% of interactions, they contributed only

112 WITTENBERG-LYLES ET AL.

10% of talk during the interaction (Nelson, Miller, & Larson,
2010). Similarly, another study found that companions (fam-
ily or friends of the patient) contributed only 7% of talk
in face-to-face interactions and 9% in telemedicine inter-
actions (Agha, Roter, & Schapira, 2009). The majority of
talk shared by companions during telemedicine encounters
involves sharing the patient’s medical symptoms and thera-
peutic regimen, followed by lifestyle and psychosocial status
and agreement statements (Agha et al., 2009). One reason for
the low involvement of family members is that telemedicine
interactions are typically structured as a dyadic encounter
between the patient and a physician. Consequently, it
has been suggested that telemedicine interactions are less
patient-centered than in-person visits because physicians
tend to dominate discussions with biomedical talk and limit
exchanges about psychosocial and lifestyle issues (Agha
et al., 2009).

ACTIVE meetings are unique because the caregiver is
the primary spokesperson on behalf of the patient and the
goal of the meeting is to collaborate rather than to provide
direct patient care. The goal of this study was to investigate
how family involvement influences interdisciplinary team
communication. Specifically, we questioned:

RQ1: How does communication differ between standard
interdisciplinary team meetings and ACTIVE team
meetings?

RQ2: How do caregivers and team members engage in
collaborative communication during ACTIVE team
meetings?

METHODS

Data for this study were drawn from a larger, ongoing
randomized controlled trial that assesses caregiver clin-
ical outcomes associated with participation in ACTIVE
meetings. In this study, hospice family caregivers are ran-
domly assigned to one of two study conditions: standard
hospice care that consists of biweekly team meeting dis-
cussions of the patient’s case, or the ACTIVE meeting,
which involves the use of Web-based video-conferencing to
enable caregivers to virtually participate in team meetings.
Participants randomized to the ACTIVE meeting (interven-
tion group) are invited to participate in biweekly meetings
for the duration of their loved one’s hospice care. During
these team meetings, caregivers are asked whether they
have any questions or concerns to share with the hospice
team. In the standard care arm of the study, hospice patients
are discussed at the regular biweekly interdisciplinary team
meetings, but caregivers are not specifically asked to par-
ticipate. The location of hospice care is unchanged for
both groups. The study was approved by both the insti-
tutional review board at the supporting university and the
participating hospices.

Participants

Caregivers were recruited from two hospices in the
Midwestern United States. To participate in the study,
caregivers had to be at least 18 years of age and be the desig-
nated primary caregiver for a hospice patient (as determined
by hospice staff). The telemedicine component required a
high-speed Internet connection with a computer to partic-
ipate in the ACTIVE meeting with video. However, audio
participation was available with any telephone device.

Procedure

Following referral by hospice staff, a member of the research
team visited the family caregiver’s home to describe the
study and obtain informed consent to participate. Once con-
sent was obtained, all participating caregivers for the patient
were randomized into standard care or participation in
ACTIVE meetings. For those randomized to ACTIVE meet-
ings, the caregivers’ residential infrastructure was assessed
to determine technology needs. Caregivers with high-speed
Internet and a computer were provided with an instruc-
tional manual and given the website address and pass-
word for the video-conferencing website. ACTIVE meetings
were facilitated through Virtually InterACTIVE Families
(www.vifamilies.com), a company that provides secure,
encrypted, password-protected video-conferencing services.
To enhance technical quality, caregivers were loaned a Web
camera (webcam) and headphones to use during team meet-
ing participation. Caregivers who lacked adequate technol-
ogy to support video-conferencing were asked to participate
via telephone. Family caregivers were provided a designated
time and date to participate in each ACTIVE meeting, but
were not trained on what to do or say during the video
conference.

Standard team meeting discussions and ACTIVE team
meeting discussions for a random selection of consent-
ing caregivers were video-recorded. Standard team meet-
ings were recorded using a webcam and laptop computer.
To enable ACTIVE meetings in the hospice office, a web
camera was connected to a laptop computer with high-speed
Internet and the screen image was projected onto a televi-
sion screen for the view of the entire hospice team. This
connection allowed family members to have a visual image
of the team as well as a two-way conversation with them.
Software on the laptop video-recorded the interaction. The
research team member who recorded meetings also com-
pleted a seating chart of team members, identified only by
their profession.

Coding Instrument

The Roter Interaction Analysis System adapted for
telemedicine (RIAS-Telemed) (Miller & Nelson, 2005;
Nelson et al., 2010) was used to code video-recordings of

HOSPICE FAMILY CAREGIVERS 113

standard and ACTIVE team meetings. The RIAS tool is used
to study dialogue in medical interactions by treating talk,
defined in terms of utterances (sentences comprising a com-
plete thought), as the unit of analysis (Wakefield et al., 2008).

Using two primary categories of talk, task and
socioemotional, the RIAS is used to code utterances between
participants and classify utterances into a mutually exclusive
category concerning the function of the talk in the inter-
action. Socioemotional talk captures the affective dimen-
sion of the interaction and includes social talk (nonmed-
ical chitchat), positive talk (agreements, jokes), negative
talk (disagreements, criticism), emotional talk (concern,
empathy, reassurance), and participatory facilitators such as
asking for opinion and checking for understanding. Task-
focused behaviors include talk related to medical problem-
solving. The specific communication features of task-
focused behavior are data gathering and patient education
and counseling. Task-focused talk includes question asking,
information giving by the provider or the caregiver, para-
phrasing, transitioning, and counseling or directing behavior.
Within these functions, content areas are detailed and include
biomedical and psychosocial topics. The RIAS-Telemed
allows utterances that are technology specific (conversation
directly related to technological aspects of the interaction)
to be coded within RIAS categories. For example, partici-
pants who asked a question related to technical quality (“Can
you hear me, now?”) were coded as asking a closed-ended
technology-related question. Finally, because the RIAS had
not been used in a team setting, we added intrateam com-
munication as a category to capture instances when team
members spoke to each other as part of the interaction.
Examples include a team member telling another team mem-
ber that they would be visiting the patient on a certain day or
taking responsibility for overseeing a specific care task.

Coding was conducted directly from video recordings.
Using the RIAS-Telemed, three members of the research
team (EWL, AG, and KW) watched video-recordings of
standard hospice team meetings and ACTIVE team meet-
ings and categorized utterances by all participants (team
members and caregivers) into one of the RIAS-Telemed cat-
egories. To ensure intercoder reliability, coders participated
in six hours of training using eight team meeting discus-
sions that were not included in this data analysis. Coders
first independently coded three cases and then met to dis-
cuss and resolve differences and refine coding categories.
Next the coders independently coded five interactions and
Pearson’s r reliability statistic was used to test for intercoder
reliability. This resulted in an average reliability of r =.87
for all categories. Coders engaged in more discussion about
differences and developed definitive coding rules for future
coding. Each video-recorded team meeting in the data set
was double-coded by members of the research team and
all differences resolved through extended discussion. The
study’s small sample size prohibited assessment of reliability
statistics for specific categories.

Analysis

To compare communication differences between standard
and ACTIVE meetings, the number and percentage of utter-
ances in all categories were calculated (socioemotional,
task-focused, technology-related). The three general RIAS
categories are used to discern differences in collaborative
practices between medical team members (medical directors
and nurses) and nonmedical team members (social workers
and chaplains). We compared the number of utterances for
socioemotional and task-focused talk by each team mem-
ber between the two groups using paired t-tests. Finally, to
examine how caregivers and team members engage in collab-
orative communication during ACTIVE meetings, the mean,
range, and percentage for specific utterances and topic of
utterance were calculated.

RESULTS

A total of 40 team meeting discussions (20 standard,
20 ACTIVE) comprised the data set. With the excep-
tion of one ACTIVE team meeting, caregivers participated
via video-conferencing (one caregiver participated via tele-
phone). Table 1 provides an overview of caregiver and
patient demographics for the team meeting discussions
analyzed for this study. The average length of standard
meeting discussion of a patient’s case was 3 minutes 38 sec-
onds, ranging from 50 seconds to 6 minutes 40 seconds.
Comparatively, the average length of the ACTIVE meet-
ings was 9 minutes, ranging from 4 minutes to 19 minutes.
There were 385 utterances in standard team meetings and
1,186 utterances in ACTIVE team meetings, reflecting the
difference in meeting length. To explore communication
differences between standard and ACTIVE team meetings
(research question 1), we examined utterances by partic-
ipant (team member’s discipline, caregiver) and by the
two primary types of talk identified by the RIAS (task
and socioemotional). The total utterances for each meet-
ing type by participant categories and talk are shown in
Table 2.

Standard and ACTIVE team meeting discussions were
predominantly task focused (89% of talk in standard, 54%
of talk in ACTIVE), with more socioemotional talk clearly
occurring during ACTIVE meetings (32% of talk compared
to 11% in standard meetings). Social workers and chaplains
did not contribute socioemotional talk during standard team
meetings, yet 32% of social worker talk and 50% of chaplain
talk focused on socioemotional issues during ACTIVE meet-
ings. Nurses also devoted more socioemotional talk (28%
of talk) in ACTIVE meetings compared to standard meet-
ings (10%). Medical directors exhibited little change in talk
between meeting types. In ACTIVE meetings, only 13.7% of
talk related to the use of technology.

114 WITTENBERG-LYLES ET AL.

TABLE 1
Summary demographic variables for patients and caregivers

Variable Caregiver (n = 25) Patient (n = 23)
Diagnosis Not applicable

Cancer 17% (4)
Dementia 13% (3)
Other 69% (16)

Patient residency Not applicable
Home 48% (11)
Nursing home 52% (12)
Mean age 59.2 years (range 35–81) 85.5 years (range 64–96)

Sex
Female 80% (20) 78% (18)
Male 20% (5) 21% (5)

Race
White/Caucasian 84% (21) 83% (19)
Black/African-American 16% (4) 17% (4)

Education
Less than high school 8% (2) Not captured
High school

24% (6)

Some college 28% (7)
Undergraduate college
degree

16% (4)

Graduate/professional
degree

24% (6)

Caregiver employment
Not employed 8% (2)
Part-time 20% (5)
Full-time 28% (7)
Other 8% (2)
Retired 36% (9)

Relationship to patient
Spouse/partner 12% (3)
Adult child 64% (16)
Sibling 4% (1)
Other relative 20% (5)

TABLE 2
Summary table of utterances by participants and by meeting type (n, %)

Standard meeting, type of talk Active meeting, Type of Talk

Team Members Socioemotional Task-Focused Total Socioemotional Task-Focused Technology-Related Total

Medical
directors

20 (12%) 144 (88%) 164 (43%) 11 (13%) 73 (85%) 2 (2%) 86 (7%)

Nurses 16 (10%) 140 (90%) 156 (41%) 101 (28%) 236 (67%) 17 (5%) 354 (30%)
Social workers 0 15 (100%) 15 (4%) 29 (32%) 55 (60%) 7 (8%) 91 (8%)
Chaplains 0 6 (100%) 6 (1%) 17 (50%) 16 (47%) 1 (3%) 34 (3%)
Othera 6 (14%) 38 (84%) 44 (11%) 39 (28%) 39 (28%) 60 (43%) 138 (12%)
Caregivers 185 (38%) 222 (46%) 76 (16%) 483 (41%)
Total 42 (11%) 343 (89%) 385 (100%) 382 (32%) 641 (54%) 163 (14%) 1, 186 (100%)

aHospice director/administrator and research personnel who were responsible for facilitating use of the technology.

There was a noticeable change in contribution among
participants between standard and ACTIVE team meet-
ings. Social workers and chaplains were less verbally
active in standard team meetings, contributing only 5% of

talk in these discussions and contributing only task-related
talk. However, their overall contribution to team meeting
discussions doubled in ACTIVE meetings to 11% of total
talk. In contrast, nurses talked less overall (41% of all

HOSPICE FAMILY CAREGIVERS 115

utterances in standard; 30% of all utterances in ACTIVE).
The biggest decrease in contribution came from medical
directors, who went from 43% of total talk in standard meet-
ings to 7% of all talk during ACTIVE meetings. Caregivers
clearly dominated ACTIVE meetings with 483 utterances
(41% of all talk).

The between-group difference in mean number of
socioemotional and task-related utterances differed sig-
nificantly for some team members (Table 3). Mean
socioemotional utterances were higher in ACTIVE meet-
ings for nurses (p = .001), social workers (p < .001), and chaplains (p = .005), but not for physicians or other partici- pants. Mean task-related utterances were higher in ACTIVE meetings for social workers (p = .009) but not for other team members.

Communication between interdisciplinary team members
and family caregivers during ACTIVE meetings (research

question two) is summarized in Table 4. Physicians and
nurses engaged in more biomedical education than social
workers and chaplains, with nurses substantially domi-
nating caregiver education (an average of 4.45 utterances
per encounter). Social workers provided considerably more
psychosocial counseling, although psychosocial counseling
to caregivers was limited overall. Nurses asked the most
questions, with the majority of questions devoted to biomed-
ical rather than psychosocial topics. Nurses also dominated
rapport-building by engaging in emotional talk and positive
talk (e.g., complimenting the work of the caregiver), while
social workers and chaplains provided some emotional talk.
Medical directors engaged in little rapport-building with
caregivers compared to other team members. All team mem-
bers, with the exception of chaplains (0%), devoted 4% of
talk to partnering with caregivers by asking for their opin-
ion, understanding, or paraphrasing discussion. Procedural

TABLE 3
Comparison of utterances of socioemotional or task-related talk between ACTIVE and standard

meetings, by type of team member [mean (95% confidence interval)]

Team Member Type of Talk ACTIVE meeting Standard Meeting p Valuea

RN Socioemotional 5.05 (3.14–6.96) 0.8 (0.29–1.31) .001
Task-related 11.8 (9.63–14.0) 7.0 (3.26–10.74) .08

Social worker Socioemotional 1.45 (0.84–2.06) 0.0 <.001 Task-related 2.75 (1.68–3.82) 0.75 (0.12–1.38) .009

Chaplain Socioemotional 0.85 (0.33–1.37) 0.0 .005
Task-related 0.80 (0.34–1.26) 0.3 (–0.05 to 0.65) .154

Physician Socioemotional 0.55 (0.09–1.01) 1.0 (0.08–1.92) .446
Task-related 3.65 (1.15–6.15) 7.2 (2.43–11.97) .223

Other Socioemotional 1.95 (0.31–3.59) 0.3 (–0.02 to 0.62) .065
Task-related 1.95 (0.10–3.80) 1.9 (1.05–2.75) .961

aPaired t-tests between ACTIVE and standard meetings, by team member and type of communication. Utterances
by caregivers and technology-related utterances are not included.

TABLE 4
Communication categories of utterances used by hospice interdisciplinary team members and family caregivers during ACTIVE meetings

Team member

Medical Directors Nurses Social Workers Chaplains Caregivers

RIAS category M R % M R % M R % M R % M R %

Education and counseling 24% 29% 47.5% 33% 38%
Biomedical .7 0–5 4.45 0–9 .6 0–4 .15 0–2 6.05 2–16
Psychosocial .25 0–3 .35 0–1 1.3 0–4 .40 0–2 1.7 0–7

Data gathering 11% 23% 9% 12% 11%
Biomedical .25 0–4 3.35 0–8 .1 0–1 .05 0–1 1.55 0–6
Psychosocial .2 0–3 .4 0–1 .25 0–2 .15 0–1 .75 0–2

Building a relationship 14% 29% 36% 52% 45%
Social .1 0–1 1.6 0–5 .5 0–3 .4 0–2 2.7 1–6
Positive .1 0–2 1.25 0–4 .5 0–3 .15 0–1 5.15 1–11
Emotional .35 0–3 1.9 0–11 .45 0–2 .3 0–2 1.25 0–6
Negative 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 .15 0–3

Partnering .15 0–3 4% .8 0–4 4% .15 0–2 4% 0 0 0 .3 0–1 2%
Procedural .15 0–3 4% .75 0–3 4.5% .05 0–1 1% 0 0 0 .2 0–2 1%
Intrateam communication 1.7 0–10 43% 1.75 0–8 10.5% .1 0–1 2.5% .05 0–1 3% n/a n/a n/a
Request for service n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a n/a .55 0–4 3%

Note. M = mean, R = range. Team member totals do not include uninterpretable utterances, utterances related to technology, and utterances made by
research staff and hospice administrators (n = 255). Caregiver totals do not include uninterpretable utterances and utterances related to technology (n = 76).

116 WITTENBERG-LYLES ET AL.

communication was also minimal and did not include con-
tributions by chaplains. Finally, medical directors and nurses
engaged in substantially more intrateam communication than
social workers and chaplains.

Similar to the team’s profile, biomedical education dom-
inated caregiver talk, with 3.5 times more biomedical dis-
closure occurring than psychosocial. Caregivers were also
twice as likely to ask questions about biomedical concerns
compared to psychosocial topics. Caregivers predominantly
worked to build a relationship with the health care team (45%
of all talk). Positive and social talk were substantially higher
than negative and emotional talk, corresponding with find-
ings regarding the team’s rapport-building profile, and illus-
trate acknowledgment of the team’s comments. Interestingly,
only 3% of caregiver talk was a request for service.

DISCUSSION

Family involvement in team meetings created a new pro-
fessional role for nurses, who emerged as informal lead-
ers. Although physicians have long been considered the
hierarchical figure in health care teams, hospice services
are largely nurse-driven, and this study illustrates nurses’
dominant role in hospice care. The large number of utter-
ances between medical directors and nurses suggests that
hospice nurses negotiate the role of subordinate-yet-equal
team members during standard team meetings, supporting
earlier work on nurse–physician relationships (Apker, Propp,
& Ford, 2005). Given that task talk was the focus of stan-
dard hospice team meetings, it was not surprising that the
biomedical focus of ACTIVE meetings was influenced by
nurses, who asked the most questions and provided the most
education and counseling on biomedical topics.

Hospice medical directors talked much less during
ACTIVE team meetings than during standard meet-
ings, neglecting the opportunity for rapport-building with
caregivers and instead opting to focus more on intrateam
communication. Unlike nurses, hospice medical directors
typically do not make home visits or assume the role of the
attending physician and thus do not develop relationships
with caregivers. The high presence of intrateam communi-
cation by medical directors illustrates that family involve-
ment enhances team member interdependence and flexibility.
By engaging in intrateam communication, medical directors
accommodate the nurse’s hierarchical position by maintain-
ing autonomy and contributing to patient or team goals as
peers rather then as leaders (Apker, Propp, & Ford, 2005).
With new regulations now requiring face-to-face visits by
medical directors, more attention will need to be paid to
a visit’s impact on family caregiver communication, care
planning, and caregiver satisfaction.

While family involvement removes the supportive nature
of the nurse’s role in the medical director–nurse relation-
ship, it also enacts the nurse’s position as superior to other

lower status team members (Apker, Propp, & Ford, 2005).
Hospice social workers and chaplains spoke considerably
less than nurses and medical directors did in both standard
and ACTIVE meetings. The lack of participation among
these nonmedical team members reveals a lack of collective
ownership of goals. However, family involvement increased
participation from social workers and chaplains who con-
tributed socioemotional talk. Although collaboration among
hospice team members commonly occurs outside of team
meetings, social workers had higher task-related talk in
ACTIVE meetings. Although limited, contribution among
all team members as well as caregivers during ACTIVE
meetings suggests collective ownership of goals among all
parties.

The organizational context and team structure influenced
communication between caregivers and team members.
Caregivers were invited to participate in already scheduled,
predetermined team meeting discussions. Caregivers did not
have flexibility regarding team meeting day, time or duration.
Consequently, ACTIVE meetings were similar to physician–
patient interactions, as caregivers and team members were
mutually influenced by one another and primarily engaged
in positive and social talk to facilitate the interaction. While
this resulted in an increase in socioemotional talk compared
to standard meetings, it is important to note that this was
primarily due to social etiquette and limited to greetings.
Caregiver positive talk was five times more likely than emo-
tional talk, revealing that socioemotional talk overall was
still restricted.

Appropriate introductions of all team members were pro-
vided to family caregivers in order to reduce anxiety and
increase understanding. However, there were often team
members on call for other team members, and caregivers
were not always clear on the roles of team members (i.e.,
specific disciplines). It may be helpful to provide caregivers
with a handout about their role in hospice care in terms of the
team structure and a template of participating team mem-
bers. Anecdotally, when caregivers were asked if they had
any concerns, many reported that there were no concerns but
they worried about the patient. More work needs to be done
to determine concrete caregiver task needs from emotional
support needs.

Important implications for how team meeting commu-
nication impacts care outcomes should be noted from the
study results. In hospice care, the team’s reflection on out-
comes should emphasize holistic pain control (physical,
psychological, social, spiritual) and caregiver bereavement
and satisfaction. Previous work has found that hospice
interdisciplinary teams engage in little collaboration dur-
ing care planning discussions and there are deficiencies
in information sharing between team members (Demiris,
Washington, Parker Oliver, & Wittenberg-Lyles, 2008).
Standard team meetings in this study predominantly con-
sisted of medical directors and nurses talking about the
patient’s case; the absence of contribution by social workers

HOSPICE FAMILY CAREGIVERS 117

and chaplains provides further evidence for collaboration
deficiencies. Holistic pain control cannot be accomplished
if nonmedical and medical team members do not contribute
equally during team meetings and if socioemotional aspects
of care are not addressed during care planning.

With few tele-health interventions specifically designed
for hospice care, this study has several implications
for telemedicine delivery (Demiris, Parker Oliver, &
Wittenberg-Lyles, 2011). First, the study shows that the use
of technology among a variety of hospice end users, includ-
ing different professional disciplines and family caregivers,
is feasible. The diffusion of technological tools in hospice
care is impacted by challenges such as user acceptance and
privacy. The low use of technology-related categories in this
study was congruent with other telemedicine research using
the RIAS instrument (Nelson et al., 2010), and caregivers in
this study demonstrate technological utilization among fam-
ily caregivers. More importantly, this study extends the use
and function of technology in hospice care as a communica-
tion tool rather then a tool to deliver one time primary care.
Our findings demonstrate that a video-conferencing platform
can facilitate the virtual participation of caregivers, allowing
them to communicate with all team members and engage in
meaningful conversations.

Second, staff members who use tele-health technology
need to learn how to practice patient-centered commu-
nication via video-conferencing (Wakefield et al., 2008).
Congruent with similar investigations of telemedicine inter-
actions, hospice team members had the most utterances
and directed the conversation (Nelson et al., 2010). In par-
ticular, nurses played a dominant role in ACTIVE meet-
ings. Prior research has found that nurses are more likely
to ask open-ended questions, communicate listening, and
make jokes on the telephone when compared to video-
mediated interactions (Wakefield et al., 2008). More research
is needed to train team members to elicit caregiver participa-
tion and engage in patient-centered communication during
telemedicine encounters.

Limitations

Communication patterns found in this study may be unique
to the hospice setting. Federally required team meetings sus-
tain an exclusive context for collaborative care planning.
A limitation of this study is that care planning discussions
for all patients were not captured; video-recordings of team
meetings only occurred for discussions about patients who
provided consent for the study. As a result, some team
talk could not be included for study analysis. Additionally,
study results could have benefitted from further examina-
tion of specific team documentation about care planning.
Care planning discussions are recorded in patient medical
charts and a comparison between the team’s perceived col-
laboration, and actual occurrences might have revealed the
team’s perceptions of the caregivers and whether or not

caregiver involvement impacted care planning documenta-
tion. Finally, the number of team members varied between
the participating hospice agencies and this study did not
take into account the size of the hospice team involved in
ACTIVE meetings. Larger groups might have influenced the
caregiver’s willingness and ability to participate in ACTIVE
meetings. Although this study is limited by a small sample
size of limited diversity, it provides insight on caregiver–
clinician interaction and raises questions about hospice team
meetings.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This project was supported by award R01NR011472 from
the National Institute of Nursing Research. The content is
solely the responsibility of the authors and does not neces-
sarily represent the official views of the National Institute of
Nursing Research or the National Institutes of Health.

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