Characteristics of Patients with Cancer Readmitted Within 30 Days to an Acute Palliative Care Unit.

Objective(s): For patients with cancer, the emergence of acute palliative care units (APCU) may hold promise in curtailing hospital readmissions. The study aims to describe the characteristics of patients readmitted to an APCU.

Methods: This retrospective study examined patients with cancer readmitted within 30 days to an APCU.

Experience With Medical Marijuana for Cancer Patients in the Palliative Setting.

Objectives: Medical marijuana is a symptom treatment option for palliative cancer patients; however, its useful applications remain limited. The goals of this study were to review the characteristics of patients who received medical marijuana under our ambulatory palliative care program and to determine barriers to access and use of medical marijuana in this population.

Methods: This study was a retrospective analysis of patients who were enrolled in the medical marijuana registry through the ambulatory palliative care department at Upstate Cancer Center.

Home Palliative Sedation Using Phenobarbital Suppositories: Time to Death, Patient Characteristics, and Administration Protocol.

Background: Most people in the United States and other countries cite their preferred location of death as their homes. However, intractable symptoms sometimes require hospitalization, especially if significant sedation becomes necessary. For over a decade, Hospice of Central New York has been using compounded phenobarbital suppositories with individuals in whom adequate sedation has not been achieved using sufficient doses of antipsychotics or benzodiazepines but prefer to remain in their homes.

Sources for superoxide release: lessons from blockade of electron transport, NADPH oxidase, and anion channels in diaphragm.

Isolated diaphragm releases low levels of superoxide (O2*-) at rest and much higher levels during heat stress. The molecular source is unknown. The hypothesis was tested that heat stress stimulates mitochondrial complex activity or NADPH oxidases, resulting in increased O2*- release.