Journal of pain and symptom management
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Feb 2019
Multicenter Study Observational StudyPrevalence and characteristics of patients being at risk of deteriorating and dying in primary care.
Understanding the prevalence and characteristics of primary care outpatients being at risk of deteriorating and dying may allow general practitioners (GPs) to identify them and initiate end-of-life discussions. ⋯ Among primary care outpatients aged over 65 years, 17.3% were at risk of deteriorating and dying regardless of their estimated survival time, and many outpatients at risk were not receiving optimal multidisciplinary care.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Feb 2019
Multicenter StudyModerating effects of forgiveness on relationship between empathy and health-related quality of life in hemodialysis patients: a structural equation modeling approach.
Health-related quality of life (QOL) is a recommended clinical tool to assess hemodialysis patients and a primary end point to observe the effectiveness of overall disease management. Empathy is associated with positive outcomes such as pain relief and reduced anxiety and distress. Numerous studies have tested the relationships among empathy, forgiveness, and QOL; however, a mechanism of forgiveness has not been fully explored in hemodialysis patients. ⋯ The results imply that empathy significantly directly and indirectly influences health-related QOL. Empathy among hemodialysis patients should be monitored and effectively managed to improve positive effects on their health-related QOL. Nurses should consider implementing empathy interventions with an emphasis on building forgiveness strategies to help hemodialysis patients improve their health-related QOL.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Feb 2019
A brief measure for the assessment of competence in coping with death: The Coping with Death Scale short version.
The coping with death competence is of great importance for palliative care professionals, who face daily exposure to death. It can keep them from suffering compassion fatigue and burnout, thus enhancing the quality of the care provided. Despite its relevance, there are only two measures of professionals' ability to cope with death. Specifically, the Coping with Death Scale (CDS) has repeatedly shown psychometric problems with some of its items. ⋯ Results indicated the psychometric boundaries of the short version of the CDS.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Feb 2019
'Just as I expected': A longitudinal cohort study of the impact of response expectancies on side effect experiences during radiotherapy for prostate cancer.
Previous research has indicated that pretreatment response expectancies of side effects often predict subsequent toxicity severity. However, this has been largely based on female patients undergoing chemotherapy. ⋯ In this older male sample, response expectancies of side effects predicted experiences throughout treatment, including the period before toxicities were medically expected. Response expectancies of sexual side effects were robust, independent predictors of subsequent toxicities across treatment, especially issues with orgasm, warranting focus in practice and future research.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Feb 2019
A Rasch Analysis of the Integrated Palliative Care Outcome Scale (IPOS).
Accurate assessment of a patient's palliative care needs is essential for the timely provision of treatment and support. The Integrated Palliative Care Outcome Scale (IPOS) is an ordinal measure possessing acceptable psychometric properties, but its ability to discriminate precisely between individual symptom levels has not been rigorously investigated. ⋯ The modified IPOS showed excellent reliability for a clinical measure in assessing the overall palliative care needs of a patient. The provided ordinal-to-interval conversion table accounts for unique contribution of each symptom to the overall symptom burden and easy to use without the need to modify the original IPOS format.