Journal of general internal medicine
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Editorial Comment
Aligning patient preferences and patient care at the end of life.
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Do-not-resuscitate (DNR) orders have been in use in hospitals nationwide for over 20 years. Nonetheless, as currently implemented, they fail to adequately fulfill their two intended purposes--to support patient autonomy and to prevent non-beneficial interventions. These failures lead to serious consequences. ⋯ Furthermore, many physicians fail to provide adequate information to allow patients or surrogates to make informed decisions and inappropriately extrapolate DNR orders to limit other treatments. Because these failings are primarily due to systemic factors that result in deficient physician behaviors, we propose strategies to target these factors including changing the hospital culture, reforming hospital policies on DNR discussions, mandating provider communication skills training, and using financial incentives. These strategies could help overcome existing barriers to proper DNR discussions and align the use of DNR orders closer to their intended purposes of supporting patient self-determination and avoiding non-beneficial interventions at the end of life.
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Anxiety and depression are common in seriously ill patients and may be associated with spiritual concerns. Little research has examined how concerns in different domains of spirituality are related to anxiety and depression. ⋯ In this diverse sample of seriously ill patients, current spiritual well-being and past negative religious experiences were associated with symptoms of anxiety and depression. Healthcare providers should consider asking about current spiritual well-being and past negative religious experiences in their assessment of seriously ill patients with symptoms of anxiety and depression.
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Randomized Controlled Trial Multicenter Study
Randomized trial of depression follow-up care by online messaging.
Quality of antidepressant treatment remains disturbingly poor. Rates of medication adherence and follow-up contact are especially low in primary care, where most depression treatment begins. Telephone care management programs can address these gaps, but reliance on live contact makes such programs less available, less timely, and more expensive. ⋯ Our findings suggest that organized follow-up care for depression can be delivered effectively and efficiently through online messaging.
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Professional interpreter use improves the quality of care for patients with limited English proficiency (LEP), but little is known about interpreter use in the hospital. ⋯ Interpreter use varied by type of clinical contact, but was overall more common with physicians than with nurses. Professional interpreters were rarely used. With physicians, use of ad hoc interpreters such as family or friends was most common; with nurses, patients often reported, "getting by" without an interpreter or barely speaking at all.