Family Resilience in Head and Neck Cancer Care: A Protocol for a Scoping Review

Head and neck cancer (HNC) is characterized by a trajectory of prolonged survivorship accompanied by significant functional and psychosocial morbidity. This places substantial and sustained caregiving demands on families, making their adaptive capacity—or family resilience—a critical determinant of long-term outcomes. However, research on family resilience in HNC is fragmented, marked by inconsistent definitions, diverse methodologies, and heterogeneous measurements. A systematic scoping review is therefore essential to map this dispersed literature, synthesize core concepts, and identify gaps to inform future family-centered practice and research.