Place of Death for Adults Receiving Specialist Palliative Care in Their Last 3 Months of Life: Factors Associated With Preferred Place, Actual Place, and Place of Death Congruence.

Congruence between the preferred and actual place of death is recognised as an important quality indicator in end-of-life care. However, there may be complexities about preferences that are ignored in summary congruence measures. This article examined factors associated with preferred place of death, actual place of death, and congruence for a sample of patients who had received specialist palliative care in the last three months of life in Ireland.

Variation in resource allocation in urgent and emergency Care Systems in Ireland.

Background: A key challenge for most systems is how to provide effective access to urgent and emergency care across rural and urban populations. Tensions about the placement and scope of hospital emergency services are longstanding in Irish political life and there has been recent reform to centralise hospital services in some regions. The focus of this paper is a system approach to examine the geographic variation in resourcing and utilisation of such care across GP practices, out-of-hours care, ambulance services, Emergency Departments and Local Injury Units in Ireland.

Understanding perspectives on major system change: A comparative case study of public engagement and the implementation of urgent and emergency care system reconfiguration.

Objectives: Major changes have been made to how emergency care services are configured in several regions in the Republic of Ireland. This study investigated the hypothesis that engagement activities undertaken prior to these changes influenced stakeholder perspectives on the proposed changes and impacted on the success of implementation.

Methods: A comparative case-study approach was used to explore the changes in three regions.

Patient experience of different regional models of urgent and emergency care: a cross-sectional survey study.

Objectives: To compare user experiences of 8 regional urgent and emergency care systems in the Republic of Ireland, and explore potential avenues for improvement.

Design: A cross-sectional survey.

Setting: Several distinct models of urgent and emergency care operate in Ireland, as system reconfiguration has been implemented in some regions but not others.

Costs of formal and informal care in the last year of life for patients in receipt of specialist palliative care.

Background: Economic evaluation of palliative care has been slow to develop and the evidence base remains small.

Aim: This article estimates formal and informal care costs in the last year of life for a sample of patients who received specialist palliative care in three different areas in Ireland.

Design: Formal care costs are calculated for community, specialist palliative care, acute hospital and other services.

Supporting patients during their breast cancer journey: the informational role of clinical nurse specialists.

Background: Research evidence suggests that a multidisciplinary team approach improves the outcomes of patients with breast cancer. However, limited attention has examined the extent to which the clinical nurse specialist's (CNS's) role can impact Irish patients' care, particularly given the novelty of this role in Ireland.

Objective: The objective of this study was to examine the informational role of CNSs in supporting Irish patients during their breast cancer journey and the extent of its impact on their care.