Palliative Nursing Summit: Nurses Leading Change and Transforming Care: The Nurse's Role in Communication and Advance Care Planning.

Advance care planning (ACP) is an essential component of quality palliative care that requires expert communication skills. Nurses are often the health care provider patients and families rely on when exploring their values and preferences and making treatment decisions. Therefore, communication and ACP was one of the 3 areas of practice addressed during the Palliative Nursing Summit.

"Our Only Child Has Died"-A Study of Bereaved Older Chinese Parents.

Long and complicated grief is a relevant factor contributing to the deterioration of the older adults' later life quality. In China, the unintentional consequence of the one-child policy has emerged. There, the group of older adults who lost their only child is called shiduers.

Enhancing collaborative leadership in palliative social work in oncology.

The Institute of Medicine (IOM) Report-Cancer Care for the Whole Patient: Meeting Psychosocial Health Needs-provided recommendations for meeting the palliative care needs of our growing population of older Americans. The IOM report highlights the demand for social work leadership across all aspects of the health care delivery system. Social workers are core interdisciplinary members of the health care team and it is important for them to be well prepared for collaborative leadership roles across health care settings.

Use of the Distress Thermometer to discern clinically relevant quality of life differences in women with breast cancer.

Purpose: The purpose of this study was to explore the ability of Distress Thermometer (DT) scores to discern important differences in quality of life scores among women with breast cancer.

Methods: The National Comprehensive Cancer Network's DT, the Functional Assessment of Cancer Therapy-Breast (FACT-B), and a demographic questionnaire were completed by 111 women recently diagnosed with breast cancer.

Results: Patients considered moderately to severely distressed (score ≥ 4 on DT) scored significantly lower on FACT-B QOL scales and subscales when compared to those in the group scoring 3 or below.

Development and validation of a scale to measure socioeconomic well-being in persons with cancer.

Socioeconomic factors substantially impact the quality of life (QOL) of persons diagnosed with cancer, yet socioeconomic well-being seldom is included as an essential domain when overall QOL is measured. This study details the development and psychometric analysis of a scale for measuring socioeconomic well-being in persons diagnosed with cancer. Coleman's theory of social class was used to define and develop the construct.