Beyond 9 to 5: Expansion of an Inpatient Specialist Palliative Care Service to 24/7 Onsite Presence.

For seriously ill hospitalized patients with a diagnosis of cancer, there exists a need for specialist palliative care, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. This article describes the expansion of a palliative care consult service in a metropolitan, dedicated cancer hospital to provide 24/7 specialist palliative care including onsite overnight presence by advanced practice registered nurses and to evaluate the impact of this change on nighttime utilization of the consult service. Inpatient management encounters and outpatient calls were compared before and after the expansion.

Bereavement risk screening: A pathway to psychosocial oncology care.

Objective: This qualitative study sought to obtain feedback from stakeholder cancer caregivers and bereaved family members on the implementation of bereavement risk screening in oncology.

Methods: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 38 family members of patients with advanced cancer (n = 12) and bereaved family members (n = 26) on when and how to effectively implement bereavement risk screening. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis.

Characteristics and Impact of Post-Transplant Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Consultation in Older Allogeneic Hematopoietic Cell Transplant Recipients.

The myriad of benefits of early palliative care (PC) integration in oncology are well established, and emerging evidence suggests that PC improves symptom burden, mood, and quality of life for hematopoietic cell transplant (HCT) recipients. Specific impact of PC consultation on outcomes of older allogeneic HCT (allo-HCT) recipients, a historically high-risk population vulnerable to transplant-related complications and mortality, has not been explored. In this single institution, retrospective analysis of 527 first allo-HCT recipients aged ≥60 years, we characterized 75 patients who had received post-HCT PC consultation and its association with geriatric vulnerabilities identified by pre-HCT geriatric assessment.

Information Framing Reduces Initial Negative Attitudes in Cancer Patients' Decisions About Hospice Care.

Background: Negative attitudes toward hospice care might prevent patients with cancer from discussing and choosing hospice as they approach end of life. When making a decision, people often naturally focus on either expected benefits or the avoidance of harm. Behavioral research has demonstrated that framing information in an incongruent manner with patients' underlying motivational focus reduces their negative attitudes toward a disliked option.

Interpreting at the End of Life: A Systematic Review of the Impact of Interpreters on the Delivery of Palliative Care Services to Cancer Patients With Limited English Proficiency.

Context: Language barriers can influence the health quality and outcomes of limited English proficiency (LEP) patients at end of life, including symptom assessment and utilization of hospice services.

Objectives: To determine how professional medical interpreters influence the delivery of palliative care services to LEP patients.

Methods: We conducted a systematic review of the literature in all available languages of six databases from 1960 to 2014.

Sequential cytoprotective responses to Sigma1 ligand-induced endoplasmic reticulum stress.

The Sigma1 receptor (Sigma1) is an endoplasmic reticulum (ER) integral membrane protein that is highly expressed in a number of cancer cell lines. Small molecule compounds targeting Sigma1 (Sigma1 ligands) inhibit cancer cell proliferation and induce apoptotic cell death in vitro and inhibit tumor growth in xenograft experiments. However, the cellular pathways activated by Sigma1 protein-ligand interaction are not well defined.

Palliative care in the outpatient oncology setting: evaluation of a practical set of referral criteria.

Background: The National Comprehensive Cancer Network's (NCCN) palliative care (PC) guidelines recommend screening all patients for PC issues at the first visit with their oncologist and at subsequent, clinically relevant times. Criteria for referral to a PC specialist are also part of the guideline. We evaluated the feasibility of screening for PC needs in outpatients attending one GI oncology practice specializing in colorectal cancer and neuroendocrine tumors.

Calcium binding sequences in calmyrin regulates interaction with presenilin-2.

Calmyrin is a myristoylated calcium binding protein that contains four putative EF-hands. Calmyrin interacts with a number of proteins, including presenilin-2 (PS2). However, the biophysical properties of calmyrin, and the molecular mechanisms that regulate its binding to different partners, are not well understood.