Palliative medicine
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The amount of information received by terminal cancer patients about their illness varies across different countries. Many Chinese families object to telling the truth to the patient and doctors often follow the wish of the families. However, a population study in Hong Kong has shown that the majority wanted the information. ⋯ It is argued that the Chinese views on autonomy and nonmaleficence do not justify non-disclosure of the truth. It is recommended that truth telling should depend on what the patient wants to know and is prepared to know, and not on what the family wants to disclose. The standard palliative care approach to breaking bad news should be adopted, but with modifications to address the 'family determination' and 'death as taboo' issues.
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Clinical guidelines are likely to be an important part of medical practice for the foreseeable future. Guidelines at their best are tools for consistency and effectiveness in patient care. Guideline methodology has evolved such that there are internationally agreed standards with which to develop and assess guidelines. ⋯ Guideline recommendations should be explicitly linked to the evidence. In order to safeguard trust, guideline development groups must have editorial independence of government, industry and special interest groups, while at the same time having regard to the implications of their recommendations. Implementation of guidelines by passive dissemination is largely ineffective; effective dissemination requires an imaginative approach tailored to the intended audience.
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Palliative medicine · Jun 2003
Comparative StudySymptoms in 400 patients referred to palliative care services: prevalence and patterns.
The demographics and prevalence of symptoms in patients at first referral to the different components of palliative care services were identified by a retrospective case note study of 400 patients referred to three palliative care centres in London, UK: Michael Sobell House, Mount Vernon Hospital; The North London Hospice; St Bartholomew's and the Royal London Hospitals. One hundred consecutive referrals to each of the following service components were analysed: a hospice inpatient service; a community team; an NHS hospital support team and an outpatient service. A standardized proforma was used to collect the data. ⋯ However, the commonest symptoms and their prevalence varied depending on the service component to which the patient was referred. Patients referred to hospice and community services had the highest symptom burden (mean number of symptoms per patient 7.21 and 7.13, respectively). This study suggests that different patient subgroups may have different needs in terms of symptoms, which will be relevant for the planning and rationalization of palliative care services.
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Palliative medicine · Jun 2003
A qualitative study of clinical nurse specialists' views on depression in palliative care patients.
Depression is the most common psychiatric illness in patients with terminal cancer. Depression not only lowers the quality of life for the patients and their families, but patients who are depressed may also have physical symptoms that are difficult to palliate and that improve as their depression is appropriately treated. However, up to 80% of the psychological and psychiatric morbidity that develops in cancer patients goes unrecognized and untreated and patients are often reluctant to spontaneously discuss symptoms with medical and nursing staff. ⋯ The lack of training in identifying psychological and psychiatric symptoms was a source of concern to nurses as was the difficulties they encountered in trying to persuade medical staff that patients required further assessment or antidepressant medication. Nurses also felt that psychiatric expertise was not utilized as fully as it could be. The findings of this study have implications for the training and support of nurse specialists in the psychological and psychiatric assessment and management of palliative care patients.