Palliative care for people who use drugs during communicable disease epidemics and pandemics: A scoping review on access, policies, and programs and guidelines.

ABSTRACT:

Background

People who use drugs with life-limiting illnesses experience substantial barriers to accessing palliative care. Demand for palliative care is expected to increase during communicable disease epidemics and pandemics. Understanding how epidemics and pandemics affect palliative care for people who use drugs is important from a service delivery perspective and for reducing population health inequities.

Aim

To explore what is known about communicable disease epidemics and pandemics, palliative care, and people who use drugs.

Design

Scoping review.

Data sources

We searched six bibliographic databases from inception to April 2021 as well as the grey literature. We included English and French records about palliative care access, programs, and policies and g

SUBMITTER: Buchman DZ 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC9760505 | biostudies-literature | 2023 Apr

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature