Prolonged grief reactions and help-seeking in bereaved adults during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted many care systems limiting bereaved peoples' ability to access social, community, and professional support. This study investigated help-seeking of people living with probable prolonged grief disorder (PGD) to identify challenges and facilitators of care, with the aim of informing bereavement practice and policy recommendations.

Methods: Participants (N = 786; 96.

Strategies to improve research participation by older people with cognitive impairment: a systematic review.

Background And Objectives: Older people with cognitive impairment are unrepresented in clinical research. Our objective was to review evidence for strategies to support their research inclusion and participation.

Research Design And Methods: Systematic review of published reports of inclusion and participation strategies for older people with cognitive impairment in clinical research (PROSPERO CRD42020212092).

Novel application of an adapted virtual cone technique for the radiosurgical treatment of a 3 mm brain metastasis with a standard multileaf collimator.

The virtual cone is an innovative MLC-based technique for generating dose distributions comparable to those of physical stereotactic cones. Initially designed for functional radiosurgery applications using a high-definition multileaf collimator (MLC) with 2.5 mm leaf width, this technique has been adapted to a standard 5 mm MLC system for treating small brain metastases.

Ensuring High Quality Treatment Plans with a Plan Quality Review Checklist.

Treatment plan quality is a crucial component for a successful outcome of radiation therapy treatments. As the complexity of radiation therapy planning and delivery techniques increases, the role of the medical physicist in assessing treatment plan quality becomes more critical. Integrating plan quality review throughout the treatment planning process allows improvements without delaying treatment or rushing to produce changes at the last minute.

A nurse-led intervention for carers of people with high-grade glioma: A case series of carers reporting high distress.

Background: Carers play an important role in supporting patients diagnosed with high-grade glioma (HGG). However, this experience is frequently distressing and many carers require support.

Objectives: To describe unmet needs of highly distressed carers of people with HGG and recommendations and referrals made by a nurse to support them within the Care-IS trial.

Support needs of Australians bereaved during the COVID-19 pandemic: A cross-sectional survey study.

Background: COVID-19 disrupted access to bereavement support. The objective of this study was to identify the bereavement supports used by Australians during the COVID-19 pandemic, perceived helpfulness of supports used, prevalence and areas of unmet support need, and characteristics of those with unmet support needs.

Methods: A convenience sample of bereaved adults completed an online questionnaire (April 2021-April 2022) about their bereavement experiences including support use and perceived helpfulness, unmet support needs and mental health.

What do carers of people with high-grade glioma perceive could improve their preparedness to care, and what additional support do they require?

Background: Concerning levels of stress, strain, and poorer mental health are observed in family carers of patients diagnosed with high-grade glioma (HGG). Understanding the reported unmet needs of these carers will enable future interventions to address such needs to improve their preparedness for care and well-being. In this secondary analysis, we aimed to explore: (i) ; and (ii)

Methods: Responses from 188 carers of patients with HGG participating in a randomized controlled trial of the Care-IS intervention were analyzed to identify reported unmet needs.

The mental health of Australians bereaved during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic: a latent class analysis.

Background: The COVID-19 pandemic disrupted many areas of life, including culturally accepted practices at end-of-life care, funeral rites, and access to social, community, and professional support. This survey investigated the mental health outcomes of Australians bereaved during this time to determine how these factors might have impacted bereavement outcomes.

Methods: An online survey indexing pandemic and bereavement experiences, levels of grief, depression, anxiety, and health, work, and social impairment.

The COVID-19 Pandemic: Bereavement Experiences Between Hospital and Home Deaths in Palliative Care.

Background: Australian COVID-19 public health measures reduced opportunities for people to communicate with healthcare professionals and be present at the death of family members/friends.

Aim: To understand if pandemic-specific challenges and public health measures during the COVID-19 pandemic impacted end-of-life and bereavement experiences differently if the death, supported by palliative care, occurred in a hospital or at home.

Design: A cross-sectional online survey was completed by bereaved adults during 2020-2022.

Technical Report: Efficient constancy evaluation of the Eclipse treatment planning system's photon and electron dose calculation algorithms aided by the third-party ClearCheck software.

Our institutional approach to performing periodic constancy checks on dose calculations for the Varian Eclipse treatment planning system is described, including details of how the Radformation ClearCheck software is leveraged for highly efficient results analysis. Photon- and electron-specific synthetic phantoms are created which allow all modality-specific fields to be spatially separated and calculated in a single plan, with field-specific structures encompassing individual irradiated volumes facilitating field-specific dose distribution evaluations. Plan comparison templates in ClearCheck allow for the near-instantaneous evaluation of 116 and 165 individual calculation metrics for photon and electron fields, respectively.

Bereavement outcomes of carers of patients with high grade glioma: Experiences of support before and after the death.

Carers of people with High Grade Glioma (HGG) completed a survey assessing their anxiety, depression, and grief in addition to open-ended questions exploring their experiences of support pre- and post-death ( = 25). One-third reported borderline or clinical levels of anxiety, depression, and grief related distress. Given the poor prognosis and rapid deterioration of patients with HGG, the findings highlight the importance of sensitive communication about prognosis early in the disease trajectory, information tailored to disease stage, the initiation of a referral to psychological support services, and timely discussions about the preferred place of care and death.

Radiosurgical treatment of solitary brain metastases using virtual cones with a standard multileaf collimator.

Purpose: The virtual cone has been previously introduced as a novel technique for generating small, spherical dose distributions using a high-definition multileaf collimator (MLC) for functional radiosurgery applications. There has been no reported investigation into adapting this technique to a standard MLC for the treatment of solitary intracranial metastases as an alternative to physical stereotactic cones. This study characterizes the virtual cone technique adapted to a standard 5 mm leaf-width MLC (VC ).

Brain cancer patients' levels of distress and supportive care needs over time.

Purpose: This study aimed to describe patient self-reported distress over time and how this was associated with wellbeing, and supportive care needs over a 6-month period from commencing chemoradiotherapy for high grade glioma (HGG).

Methods: In this prospective cohort study, participants completed surveys at three time points: before chemoradiotherapy, at 3 and 6 months. These included Distress Thermometer, Functional Assessment of Cancer/Brain Cancer Treatment-general (Fact-G/FACT-BR), Supportive Care Needs Scale (SF-34) and Brain Tumour Specific subscale.

Limits for the therapeutic application of the analytical anisotropic algorithm in the context of ablative lung radiotherapy near the minima of lung density and tumor size.

Purpose: To systematically investigate the performance of the analytical anisotropic algorithm (AAA) within the extremes of small tumor volumes and near-minimum lung and tumor tissue densities in order to identify combinations of these parameters where the use of AAA could result in a therapeutically unacceptable loss of tumor coverage on an energy and fractionation-specific basis.

Methods: Clinically appropriate volumetric modulated arc therapy (VMAT) treatment plans were generated with AAA for 180 unique combinations of lung density (0.05-0.

Supportive care of patients diagnosed with high grade glioma and their carers in Australia.

Purpose: This study aimed to: determine the supportive care available for Australian patients with High Grade Glioma (HGG) and their carers; identify service gaps; and inform changes needed to implement guidelines and Optimal Care Pathways.

Methods: This cross-sectional online survey recruited multidisciplinary health professionals (HPs) who were members of the Cooperative Trials Group for Neuro-Oncology involved in management of patients diagnosed with HGG in Australian hospitals. Descriptive statistics were calculated.

I didn't want to remember memories of caring, but I can't help it": A qualitative study of the experiences of bereaved Iranian carers with elevated levels of prolonged grief symptoms.

The lived experience of caring for people with cancer and the influence of culture on Iranian carers who have elevated levels of prolonged grief symptoms after the death has received little in-depth attention. Bereaved carers ( = 17) were interviewed. All showed high levels of prolonged grief symptoms.

Patients', caregivers' and clinicians' understandings of an advance care planning process: the example of ambulance palliative care plans.

Background: With the introduction of New South Wales Ambulance Authorised Palliative Care Plans within a metropolitan palliative care service, the perspectives of patients, caregivers and clinicians and their understandings of the processes involved in completing the Plans were investigated.

Methods: This qualitative sub-study used semi-structured interviews. Nineteen patients and caregivers who had received an Ambulance Palliative Care Plan and 10 clinicians who completed the Plans were interviewed (n=4) or participated in a focus group (n=6).

Australian specialist palliative care's response to COVID-19: an anonymous online survey of service providers.

Background: The corona virus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has required specialist palliative care (SPC) services to respond by: (I) integrating infection prevention/control measures into care for their usual caseloads and (II) providing consultations and/or care for people dying from a new disease entity. The aim of the current study was to learn about the response of Australian SPC services to COVID-19 and its consequences in order to inform pandemic practice and policy.

Methods: A cross-sectional, anonymous survey was administered online from May to July 2020.

The Development of the Australian National Palliative Care Clinical Studies Collaborative "Integrating Qualitative Research into Clinical Trials Framework".

Qualitative methodologies have multiple contributions to health research, including improving baseline understanding in new areas of enquiry; questioning existing assumptions; understanding viewpoints of specific subgroups; and offering complex, contextual information. While the role of qualitative research within mixed methods approaches is well documented, the contribution to clinical trial design and conduct is less well recognized. The Australian Palliative Care Clinical Studies Collaborative and Cancer Symptom Trials have developed a framework to detail how qualitative research might contribute to each key aspect of clinical trials.

Dosimetric feasibility of brain stereotactic radiosurgery with a 0.35 T MRI-guided linac and comparison vs a C-arm-mounted linac.

Purpose: MRI is the gold-standard imaging modality for brain tumor diagnosis and delineation. The purpose of this work was to investigate the feasibility of performing brain stereotactic radiosurgery (SRS) with a 0.35 T MRI-guided linear accelerator (MRL) equipped with a double-focused multileaf collimator (MLC).