• Jun Hamano, Ai Oishi, and Yoshiyuki Kizawa.
• 1 Division of Clinical Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Tsukuba , Tsukuba, Japan .
• J Palliat Med. 2018 Jul 1; 21 (7): 992-998.

BackgroundIdentifying patients who require palliative care approach is challenging for family physicians, even though several identification tools have been developed for this purpose.ObjectiveTo explore the prevalence and characteristics of family practice patients who need palliative care approach as determined using Supportive and Palliative Care Indicators Tool (SPICT™, April 2015) in Japan.DesignSingle-center cross-sectional study.Setting/SubjectsWe enrolled all patients ≥65 years of age who visited the chief researcher's outpatient clinic in October 2016.MeasurementsWe used Japanese version of SPICT (SPICT-J) to identify patients who need palliative care approach. We assessed patients' backgrounds and whether they had undergone advance care planning with their family physicians.ResultsThis study included 87 patients (61 females) with a mean age of 79.0 ± 7.4 years. Eight patients (9.2%) were identified as needing palliative care approach. The mean age of patients who needed this approach was 82.3 ± 8.3 years and main underlying conditions were heart/vascular disease (37.5%), dementia/frailty (25.0%), and respiratory disease (12.5%). Only two of eight patients identified as needing palliative care approach had discussed advance care planning with their family physicians.ConclusionsIn family practice, 9.2% of outpatients ≥65 years of age were identified as needing palliative care approach. Family physicians should carefully evaluate whether outpatients need palliative care approach.

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