Constructing an intervention to foster posttraumatic growth in people living with a life limiting illness and receiving palliative care: Participatory action research.

Objectives: People living with cancer and other life limiting illnesses often experience spiritual and existential distress. This distress may be linked to trauma related to the disease, treatment or preexisting posttraumatic stress, which may be exacerbated. Interventions based on posttraumatic growth have proven to be successful in promoting psychological, spiritual and existential wellbeing in people suffering chronic pain and spinal cord injury. This project aimed to design and develop an intervention to promote psychological and spiritual well-being in people with a life-limiting illness receiving palliative care by drawing on the principles of posttraumatic growth.

Methods: Action research cycles, based on a participatory health perspective to include those living with life limiting illness and/or practitioners associated with their care in all stages of the study, were used to design and develop an intervention based on posttraumatic growth principles. People experienced in delivering palliative care services in hospital and/or community settings (N = 30) and those suffering life limiting illnesses and receiving palliative care (N = 9) participated in this study. Two pilot programs were run.

Results: Participatory action research, used iteratively in two pilot programs, was employed to design and develop a novel intervention based on posttraumatic growth suitable for use in the palliative care context.

Conclusions: This intervention developed using a posttraumatic growth framework has the capacity to improve the lives of people living with a life-limiting illness while receiving palliative care.