Palliative medicine
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Palliative medicine · Dec 2021
Randomized Controlled TrialVirtual reality for pain management in advanced heart failure: A randomized controlled study.
Hospitalized patients with advanced heart failure often experience acute and/or chronic pain. While virtual reality has been extensively studied across a wide range of clinical settings, no studies have yet evaluated potential impact on pain management on this patient population. ⋯ Virtual reality may be an effective nonpharmacologic adjuvant pain management intervention in hospitalized patients with heart failure.
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Palliative medicine · Dec 2021
Performance status and trial site-level factors are associated with missing data in palliative care trials: An individual participant-level data analysis of 10 phase 3 trials.
Missing data compromise the internal and external validity of trial findings, however there is limited evidence on how best to reduce missing data in palliative care trials. ⋯ Participants with a poorer performance status are at higher risk of missing data in palliative care trials and require additional support to provide complete data. Performance status is a potential auxiliary variable for missing data imputation models. Reducing trial variability should be prioritised and further factors need to be identified and explored to explain the residual variance.
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Palliative medicine · Dec 2021
Changes in mortality patterns and place of death during the COVID-19 pandemic: A descriptive analysis of mortality data across four nations.
Understanding patterns of mortality and place of death during the COVID-19 pandemic is important to help provide appropriate services and resources. ⋯ Where people died changed during the COVID-19 pandemic, with an increase in deaths at home during and between pandemic waves. This has implications for planning and organisation of palliative care and community services. The extent to which these changes will persist longer term remains unclear. Further research could investigate whether this is reflected in other countries with high COVID-19 mortality.
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Palliative medicine · Dec 2021
The effects of confronting one's own end of life on older individuals and those with a life-threatening disease: A systematic literature review.
Awareness of the impending end of one's life can pose profound existential challenges, thereby impairing well-being. Confronting one's own end of life may be an approach to meet the psychological needs and consequently enhance overall well-being. Different approaches of confrontation have been evaluated positively using measures of psychosocial comfort. To date, there exists no systematic overview on the different ways of confrontation (e.g. psychosocial or individual coping approaches). ⋯ Low-threshold opportunities of confrontation have the potential to improve well-being and should be emphasized in practical implementation. The results can serve as a comprehensive basis for future research aiming to investigate the determinants of psychosocial comfort for people nearing the end of life.