Which has more influence on a family's assessment of the quality of dying of their long-term care resident with dementia: Frequency of symptoms or quality of communication with healthcare team?

Objective: Symptoms present at the end of life and the quality of communication with the healthcare team have both been shown to impact family assessments of the quality of dying of their loved one with dementia. However, the relative contributions of these two factors to family assessments have not yet been investigated. To address this knowledge gap, we explored which of these two factors has more influence on family assessments of the quality of dying of long-term care (LTC) residents with dementia.