Predictive Models for Palliative Care Needs of Advanced Cancer Patients Receiving Chemotherapy.

Context: Early palliative care is recommended within eight-week of diagnosing advanced cancer. Although guidelines suggest routine screening to identify cancer patients who could benefit from palliative care, implementing screening can be challenging due to understaffing and time constraints.

Objectives: To develop and evaluate machine learning models for predicting specialist palliative care needs in advanced cancer patients undergoing chemotherapy, and to investigate if predictive models could substitute screening tools.