Journal of palliative medicine
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Specialized pediatric palliative care programs aim to improve quality of life and ease distress of patients and their families across the illness trajectory. These programs require further development, which should be based on how they improve outcomes for patients, families, health care professionals, and the health care system. ⋯ Many indicators were used to assess program outcomes with little definition consensus across studies. Development of a set of agreed-upon indicators to assess program impact concurrent with family and patient input is essential to advance research and practice in pediatric palliative care.
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Comparative Study
The Impact of Hemodialysis on Terminal Cancer Patients in Hospices: A Nationwide Retrospective Study in Taiwan.
Hemodialysis (HD) is the most common renal replacement therapy for patients with end-stage renal disease in Taiwan. The use of HD in hospice care and its impact on terminal cancer patients remains unclear. ⋯ For terminal cancer patients under hospice care, HD was associated with a younger age, long terminal hospice stay, and high medical costs. Some types of cancers were associated with HD. University-affiliated hospitals played significant roles in non-HD renal supportive care. In-hospice HD is still common in Taiwan. Dialysis withdrawal and alternative care have space to promoting in hospice care.
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Palliative surgical procedures are frequently performed to reduce symptoms in patients with advanced cancer, but quality is difficult to measure. ⋯ NLP offers opportunities to identify patients receiving palliative surgical procedures and can rapidly assess established end-of-life process measures with an accuracy approaching that of human coders.
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Despite real needs, very few chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) patients with life-limiting disease receive a well-organized support for palliative care (PC). ⋯ Tele-assisted PC is feasible and well accepted. According to these observations, a suitable supportive program can be the goal of a future study.