Supportive care in cancer : official journal of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer
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Support Care Cancer · May 2007
The impact of the palliative care mobile team on symptom assessment and medication profiles in patients admitted to a comprehensive cancer center.
In recent years, tertiary care hospitals and cancer centers have shown great interest in forming palliative care consultation teams. Thus, these centers may be interested in the types of care that such teams give, which could help the other centers put together their own teams. However, the availability of such information is limited. The purpose of our study was therefore to describe the experience of a palliative care team at our comprehensive cancer center. ⋯ Palliative care mobile teams make multiple changes in previous medications and provide almost universal counseling services to patients and families. The length of involvement with the patient and family is short; therefore, rapid stabilization and counseling are required. Our findings regarding medication changes could be helpful to tertiary care hospitals and cancer centers considering palliative care consultation teams.