Journal of palliative medicine
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Inpatient Palliative Care (PC) consultations help develop a patient-centered and quality-of-life-focused plan of care for patients with serious illness. Discharge summaries (DSs) are an essential tool to maintain continuity of these care plans across multiple locations and providers. ⋯ More than one in five DSs lacked any code words of the completed PC consultation and more than one in three DSs lacked mention of PC. As DSs are the main source of provider communication, it is critical they reflect the key discussion points from the PC consultation, which will improve the transition of care and provider communication.
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Our aim was to obtain initial estimates of the effect of a palliative care and medical oncology co-rounding model on hospital length of stay, proportion of patients reviewed by specialist palliative care (SPC), and proportion of patients who were readmitted within 7 and 30 days of hospital discharge. ⋯ In our target population, the co-rounding model was associated with a shorter hospital length of stay.
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Patient-centered outcomes research (PCOR) methods and social learning theory (SLT) require intensive interaction between researchers and stakeholders. Advance care planning (ACP) is valuable before major surgery, but a systematic review found no extant perioperative ACP tools. Consequently, PCOR methods and SLT can inform the development of an ACP educational video for patients and families preparing for major surgery. ⋯ Through an iterative process utilizing diverse PCOR engagement methods and informed by SLT, storyboards were developed for an ACP video. Field testing revealed the storyline to be highly meaningful for surgery patients and family members.
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The My Kite Will Fly (MKWF) research program is built on the well-documented need for effective clinical communication tools and therapeutic interventions where a child's mother is diagnosed with life-threatening gynecological cancer. ⋯ Results from this pilot cohort confirm the importance of enhanced parent-child communication and stabilized family routines. Current results provide an important platform for future evaluative research among larger patient-family populations across multisite oncology settings.
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Nurses and nursing care providers provide the most direct care to patients at end of life. Yet, evidence indicates that many feel ill-prepared for the complexity of palliative care. ⋯ Resources exist to support palliative education for nurses and nursing care providers. Furthermore, the evidence suggests good outcomes from this education. However, there is no dedicated strategy for implementing those resources. Furthermore, there is little evidence of the critical role of knowledge translation in preparing nurses and nursing care providers for evidence-informed palliative practice.