Symptom management in the home-based terminal cancer patient.

Comprehensive symptom management is the hallmark of good medical care of the terminally ill cancer patient. Careful attention to patient comfort and early assessment and intervention to alleviate distressing symptoms enable the patient to remain at home, and maximize the quality time which the patient and family can share.

Multicyclic antidepressant serum drug assays: a utilization review.

Multicyclic antidepressant (MCA) kinetics are complex and influenced by many factors, making clinical interpretation of serum concentration data difficult. To assess the effectiveness of MCA serum assay utilization in a private, university-affiliated psychiatric hospital, actual use over a 1-year period was reviewed retrospectively against criteria derived from the contemporary literature. Overall, compliance with the criteria was poor.