Journal of pain and symptom management
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J Pain Symptom Manage · May 2011
Continuous deep sedation until death in Belgium: a survey among nurses.
Continuous deep sedation (CDS) is a subject of important debate, but until now nurses have rarely been questioned about their involvement and perceptions. ⋯ Nurses in different health care settings are often involved in communication about CDS. They see it mainly as a practice intended to hasten death, with a life-shortening effect; guidelines should recommend clear discussions between caregivers in which the physician states the purpose and estimated effect of the decision.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · May 2011
Association between self-reported sleep disturbance and other symptoms in patients with advanced cancer.
Sleep disturbance (SD) is a significant source of distress for patients with cancer. Studies of patients with advanced cancer receiving palliative care to identify symptoms associated with the severity of SD are limited. ⋯ SD is associated with increased frequency of pain, depression, anxiety, and a worse sense of well-being. These four symptoms should be assessed in all patients with advanced cancer with a complaint of SD. The ideal cutoff point of the ESAS-Sleep item for screening for SD is a score of ≥ 3. More research is needed to better characterize this frequent and distressing syndrome.
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Knowledge about factors influencing the place of death may be very useful for the planning of public health strategies to improve the situation of terminally ill patients. ⋯ Compared with other European countries, home death is still a frequent event in the federal state of Rhineland-Palatinate. Regional health policy should consider the actual distribution of place of death and corresponding predicting factors when establishing specialized palliative care home services as designed by recent German health legislation.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · May 2011
"It depends": viewpoints of patients, physicians, and nurses on patient-practitioner prayer in the setting of advanced cancer.
Although prayer potentially serves as an important practice in offering religious/spiritual support, its role in the clinical setting remains disputed. Few data exist to guide the role of patient-practitioner prayer in the setting of advanced illness. ⋯ Most patients and practitioners view patient-practitioner prayer as at least occasionally appropriate in the advanced cancer setting, and most patients view prayer as spiritually supportive. However, the appropriateness of patient-practitioner prayer is case specific, requiring consideration of multiple factors.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · May 2011
Review Meta AnalysisEffectiveness of knowledge translation interventions to improve cancer pain management.
Cancer pain is prevalent, yet patients do not receive best care despite widely available evidence. Although national cancer control policies call for education, effectiveness of such programs is unclear and best practices are not well defined. ⋯ Trials that used a higher dose of KT intervention (characterized by extensive follow-up, comprehensive educational program, and higher resource allocation) were significantly more likely to have positive results than trials that did not use this approach. Further attention to methodological issues to improve educational interventions and research to clarify factors that lead to better pain control are urgently needed.