Publications by authors named "Mervyn Yong Hwang Koh"

Objectives: The complex care needs and high mortality of critically ill patients in intensive care unit (ICU) warrants a team approach. While studies have affirmed the integral role of palliative care teams in ICU, little is known about the ICU healthcare professional's perception on how this integration affects the care of the critically ill.This study examines their perception of how integration of palliative care into ICU practice affects interprofessional collaborative practices and relationships in the delivery of care.

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Objectives: Burnout is common among palliative care clinicians, occurring as a result of emotions experienced in caring for challenging patients or families. Awareness of these scenarios helps clinicians and teams appropriately manage their own emotions and prevent burnout. We studied challenging clinical situations and the emotions encountered by experienced palliative care clinicians which could potentially contribute to burnout.

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Objectives: Although patients living with end-stage organ disease (ESOD) suffer unmet needs from the physical and emotional burdens of living with chronic illness, they are less likely to receive palliative care.The aims of the study were to determine if palliative care referrals reduced healthcare utilisation and if impact on healthcare utilisation was dependent on the timing of the referral.

Methods: Patients with ESOD who received palliative care support were matched with those who did not using coarsened exact matching and propensity score matching, and compared in this retrospective cohort study.

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Objectives: We conducted a pilot quality improvement (QI) project with the aim of improving accessibility of palliative care to critically ill neurosurgical patients.

Methods: The QI project was conducted in the neurosurgical intensive care unit (NS-ICU). Prior to the QI project, referral rates to palliative care were low.

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Content: Burnout occurs commonly in palliative care. Building resilience helps to mitigate the effects of burnout. Little is known about the importance of leaders, teams and organisations in preventing burnout and promoting resilience in palliative care.

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Objectives: To determine the economic benefit of an integrated home-based palliative care programme for advanced dementia (Programme Dignity), evaluation is required. This study aimed to estimate Programme Dignity's average monthly cost from a provider's perspective; and compare healthcare utilisation and costs of programme patients with controls, accounting for enrolment duration.

Methods: This was a retrospective cohort study.

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Shared leadership has been shown to enhance processes, effectiveness, and performances in interprofessional teams. While earlier studies suggest the association of internal team environment (ITE) and transactive memory system (TMS) with shared leadership, the relative influence of these team conditions vis-a-vis team characteristics (such as team size, stability, and interprofessional roles) on shared leadership is not well understood. This study aims to examine the comparative influence of team characteristics versus team conditions of ITE and TMS on shared leadership during interprofessional team meetings (IPTMs).

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Objectives: We established an integrated palliative homecare programme for advanced dementia. This study explores patients' symptoms and quality-of-life and their association with enteral feeding, evaluates the impact of the programme on these parameters and examines familial caregiver burden.

Methods: This is a prospective cohort study.

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Objective: To develop and validate a simple prognostic tool for early prediction of survival of patients with advanced cancer in a tertiary care setting.

Design: Prospective cohort study with 2 years' follow-up.

Setting: Single tertiary teaching hospital in Singapore.

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Background: The prevalence of burnout, psychological morbidity and the use of coping mechanisms among palliative care practitioners in Singapore have not been studied.

Aim: We aimed to study the prevalence of burnout and psychological morbidity among palliative care practitioners in Singapore and its associations with demographic and workplace factors as well as the use of coping mechanisms.

Design: This was a multi-centre, cross-sectional study of all the palliative care providers within the public healthcare sector in Singapore.

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