• Claire E Johnson, Peta McVey, Joel Jin-On Rhee, Hugh Senior, Leanne Monterosso, Briony Williams, Julia Fallon-Ferguson, Matthew Grant, Harriet Nwachukwu, Michèle Aubin, Patsy Yates, and Geoffrey Mitchell.
• Medical School, The University of Western Australia, Perth, Western Australia, Australia.
• BMJ Support Palliat Care. 2018 Jul 25.

BackgroundWith an increasing ageing population in most countries, the role of general practitioners (GPs) and general practice nurses (GPNs) in providing optimal end of life (EoL) care is increasingly important.ObjectiveTo explore: (1) patient and carer expectations of the role of GPs and GPNs at EoL; (2) GPs' and GPNs' contribution to advance care planning (ACP) and (3) if primary care involvement allows people to die in the place of preference.MethodSystematic literature review.Data SourcesPapers from 2000 to 2017 were sought from Medline, Psychinfo, Embase, Joanna Briggs Institute and Cochrane databases.ResultsFrom 6209 journal articles, 51 papers were relevant. Patients and carers expect their GPs to be competent in all aspects of palliative care. They valued easy access to their GP, a multidisciplinary approach to care and well-coordinated and informed care. They also wanted their care team to communicate openly, honestly and empathically, particularly as the patient deteriorated. ACP and the involvement of GPs were important factors which contributed to patients being cared for and dying in their preferred place. There was no reference to GPNs in any paper identified.ConclusionsPatients and carers prefer a holistic approach to care. This review shows that GPs have an important role in ACP and that their involvement facilitates dying in the place of preference. Proactive identification of people approaching EoL is likely to improve all aspects of care, including planning and communicating about EoL. More work outlining the role of GPNs in end of life care is required.© Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2018. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.

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