International journal of palliative nursing
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Although a number of successful adult combined pain and palliative care programmes exist worldwide, integrated paediatric pain and palliative care services are rare. This article reviews epidemiology, definition, symptom prevalence and myths in paediatric palliative care. It then describes the development of the Pediatric Pain and Palliative Care Programme at the Children's Hospitals and Clinics of Minnesota, USA. ⋯ It is the only paediatric hospice provider in the state of Minnesota. One of the advantages of an integrated Pain and Palliative Care Programme such as the one described in this article, may be the provision of care in a continuum from acute, chronic or recurrent pain to palliative care and hospice care. This example shows, that integrated paediatric pain medicine and palliative care programmes can be successfully implemented in a children's hospital setting.