Palliative medicine
-
Palliative medicine · Jan 2015
Multicenter StudyPalliative Care Phase: inter-rater reliability and acceptability in a national study.
The concept of palliative care consisting of five distinct, clinically meaningful, phases (stable, unstable, deteriorating, terminal and bereavement) was developed in Australia about 20 years ago and is used routinely for communicating clinical status, care planning, quality improvement and funding. ⋯ Policy makers, funders and clinicians can be confident that Palliative Care Phase is a reliable and acceptable measure that can be used for care planning, quality improvement and funding purposes.
-
Palliative medicine · Jan 2015
Quality indicators for palliative care services: mixed-method study testing for face validity, feasibility, discriminative power and usefulness.
In the absence of a standardized, comprehensive and valid set of quality indicators for palliative care, we developed one for palliative care services in Belgium. ⋯ Based on the results, minor adjustments were made to individual indicators, to the measurement tools and to the procedure used; the quality indicators are now ready for further evaluation and use across palliative care services in Belgium. As soon as these indicators are being used systematically, it will be possible to demonstrate and compare quality at the national and international levels and to evaluate improvement initiatives.
-
Palliative medicine · Jan 2015
Administering anticipatory medications in end-of-life care: a qualitative study of nursing practice in the community and in nursing homes.
In the United Kingdom, an approach to improving end-of-life care has been the introduction of 'just in case' or 'anticipatory' medications. Nurses are often responsible for deciding when to use anticipatory medications, but little is known about their experiences. ⋯ Nurses take a leading role in the administration of anticipatory medications. Nurses apply consideration and caution to the administration of anticipatory medications but some experience emotional burden. Education, training and experience played a role in the nurses' confidence and should continue to be central to efforts to improving the quality of palliative care in the community and nursing homes.