What affects District Nurses' provision of psychological support to palliative patients and their families?

Through an ethically sensitive, practitioner-ethnographer approach, this study aims to understand the nature, context and scope of DNs' provision of psychological support as part of palliative care for patients and their families. A two-staged approach is proposed - stage one involves preliminary data collection and analysis, whilst stage two has a more applied focus and seeks to refine preliminary analysis for clinical application, through stakeholder engagement.
A multiple-method design, incorporating participant-observation of DN home visits will aid understanding of the different contextual layers affecting patient-carer-nurse interactions and overall practice provision.