Specialist palliative care until the very end of life - reports of family caregivers and the multiprofessional team.

ABSTRACT:

Background

Specialist palliative care (SPC) includes care for incurably ill patients and their family caregivers at home or on a palliative care ward until the very end of life. However, in the last days of life, patients can rarely express their needs and little is known about SPC outcomes as reported by multiprofessional SPC teams and family caregivers.

Methods

Using the Palliative Care Outcome Scale (POS; Score 0-40), proxy assessments of SPC outcomes in the patient's last 3 days of life were performed by SPC teams and primary family caregivers of three home care and three inpatient services. Additional questions were asked about problems solved 'particularly well' or 'inadequately' (last 7 days), which were content analyzed and quantified.

Results

Proxy assessment

SUBMITTER: Ullrich A 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC10563273 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Oct

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature