Articles: palliative-care.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2022
Development of Palliative Care Services at a Tertiary Care Teaching Hospital in Pakistan: retrospective analysis of existing Palliative Care program.
Palliative care (PC) is an important aspect of providing holistic care to patients and their families who are dealing with a serious or life limiting illness. Medical community and public poorly understand the implications and benefits of these services. Unfortunately, because of this, PC remains a neglected area of healthcare in the most institutions of Pakistan. ⋯ The enormous burden of life-threatening illnesses is associated with physical and psychosocial sufferings, which explains the illustrious need for PC in developing countries such as Pakistan. PCS at AKUH initiated in 2017. Nevertheless, there are challenges to service expansion and progress, which are being addressed.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2022
Project ECHO in the Caribbean: Building a Virtual Community for Palliative Care Education Needs.
Despite a growing need, palliative care education tools tailored to providers in the Caribbean remain extremely limited. We conducted a mixed methods analysis of the first Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) model adapted for palliative care providers in the Caribbean. ⋯ They described significant improvements in their sense of community (1.23, P ≤ 0.01), confidence in palliative care skills (0.64, P ≤ 0.01), and knowledge for each monthly topic. Our findings suggest that the ECHO model has been successfully adapted to the needs of palliative care providers in the Caribbean, though further capacity building, public policy, and research are needed to broaden access to palliative care across the region.
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Nepal has witnessed demographic and epidemiological transition resulting in the shift from infectious diseases to non-communicable diseases as the major disease burden. Around 60% of mortalities and morbidities are attributable to non-communicable diseases of which the majority end with the need for palliative care services. The current palliative care services in Nepal are in the infancy stage compared with other services. Undignified dying is a challenging public health problem and as such requires a public health approach to address it with the involvement of all stakeholders. Recognizing the need for the end spectrum of non-communicable diseases patients, the Ministry of Health, Nepal recently introduced the policy to address the unmet need through the community-based palliative care program, a laudable initiation. ⋯ community health care; Nepal; palliative care; public health.
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J Pain Symptom Manage · Aug 2022
ReviewProgress update: Development of palliative care from 2017 to 2020 in five countries in Eurasia.
In the early 2000s, palliative care was largely unknown in the Eurasian region. For a period of twenty years starting around 2002, Open Society Foundations (OSF) supported palliative care pioneers in the region to establish palliative care services, train health providers, and advocate for the integration into health services. ⋯ Experiences in these countries suggest that a strategy that initially emphasizes training, technical assistance, and engagement to create the building blocks for palliative care combined with or followed by public advocacy and campaigning to demand roll out of services can result in significant advances. Continued progress, however, is not guaranteed, especially considering the COVID-19 pandemic and dwindling donor support.
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Background: Episodic dyspnea (ED) is a common problem in patients with advanced lung cancer (LC). However, the prevalence of ED and other related aspects in this patient population is not known. Objectives: To assess and describe the prevalence, clinical features, treatment, and risk factors for ED in outpatients with advanced LC. ⋯ Conclusions: ED is highly prevalent and severe in outpatients with advanced LC experiencing BD. The association between intrathoracic comorbidities and oxygen therapy points to alveolar oxygen exchange failure having a potential etiopathogenic role in ED in this population. Further studies are needed to better characterize ED in LC to better inform treatments and trial protocols.