Point-of-care ultrasound in palliative medicine residency programs: report of a national survey and local workshop.

Purpose: Point-of-care ultrasound (POCUS) is used in various clinical specialties to improve diagnostic and procedural accuracy and has many potential applications in palliative care. However, it is unclear what is the current state of training and use of POCUS in palliative care in Canada. Our objectives were to understand the current state of training and use of POCUS in Canadian Palliative Medicine subspecialty residency programs and to develop and implement a local training workshop for POCUS in palliative care.

Care Coordination Between Family Physicians and Palliative Care Physicians for Patients With Cancer: Results of a Quality Improvement Initiative.

Purpose: At our institution's cancer palliative care (PC) clinic, new referrals from oncologists were scheduled for consultation and ongoing follow-up by PC physicians without input from the patients' family physicians (FPs). FPs reported that they felt out of the loop. We implemented a quality improvement (QI) initiative aimed at systematically facilitating care coordination between FPs and PC physicians.

Quality of End-of-Life Care for People with Advanced Non-Small Cell Lung Cancer in Ontario: A Population-Based Study.

Unlabelled: Ensuring high quality end of life (EOL) care is necessary for people with advanced non-small-cell lung cancer (NSCLC), given its high incidence, mortality and symptom burden. Aggressive EOL care can adversely affect the quality of life of NSCLC patients without providing meaningful oncologic benefit.

Objectives: (1) To describe EOL health services quality indicators and timing of palliative care consultation provided to patients dying of NSCLC.

Code Status Documentation Availability and Accuracy Among Emergency Patients with End-stage Disease.

Introduction: Some patients with end-stage disease who may neither want nor benefit from aggressive resuscitation receive such treatment if they cannot communicate in an emergency. Timely access to patients' current resuscitation wishes, or "code status," should be a key metric of electronic health records (EHR). We sought to determine what percentage of a cohort of patients with end-stage disease who present to the emergency department (ED) have accessible, code status documents, and for those who do, how quickly can this documentation be retrieved.

Defining and implementing early palliative care for persons diagnosed with a life-limiting chronic illness: a scoping review protocol.

Objective: This review will explore definitions of early palliative care and describe how it has been implemented for those diagnosed with a life-limiting chronic illness.

Introduction: People with life-limiting chronic illnesses who receive palliative care interventions have increased quality of life, better symptom management, and are more likely to have advance care plans than patients who do not have life-limiting chronic illness. It is therefore best practice to encourage early identification of persons in need of palliative care services.

Management of Cancer-Associated Intestinal Obstruction in the Final Year of Life.

Background: There is variation in the clinical management of intestinal obstruction (IO) in patients with cancer. We describe the management of cancer-associated IO near the end of life in a population-based cohort with universal health coverage.

Methods: Patients who died of gastric, colorectal, ovarian, and pancreatic cancers from 2002 to 2015 were identified from the Ontario Cancer Registry.

Palliative Care and Symptom Burden in the Last Year of Life: A Population-Based Study of Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer.

Introduction: The symptom profile in cancer patients and the association between palliative care (PC) and symptoms has not been studied in the general population. We addressed these gaps in gastrointestinal (GI) cancer patients in the final year of life.

Methods: Patients dying of esophageal, gastric, colon, and anorectal cancers during 2003-2015 were identified.

Palliative Care is Associated with Reduced Aggressive End-of-Life Care in Patients with Gastrointestinal Cancer.

Background: We examined the delivery of physician palliative care (PC) services and its association with aggressive end-of-life care (EOLC) in patients with gastrointestinal (GI) cancer in Ontario, Canada.

Methods: All patients with primary cause of death from esophageal, gastric, colon, and anorectal cancer from January 2003 to December 2013 were identified. PC services within 2 years of death were classified: (1) any PC; (2) timing of first PC (≤ 7, 8-90, 91-180, and 181-730 days before death); and (3) intensity of PC measured by number of days used (1st-25th, 26th-50th, 51st-75th, and 76th-100th percentiles).