Objective: We sought to describe palliative care services available to children with cancer along with pediatric oncologists' current and ideal practices of palliative care involvement in children with cancer.
Design: A novel survey tool was administered via REDCap to attending pediatric oncologists in the United States. The survey remained open from June to September 2020.
Results: A total of 265 survey responses were evaluated. Most respondents endorsed that palliative care should "always" be consulted for the following scenarios: new diagnosis of advanced/metastatic disease (53%), uncontrolled symptoms (65%), bone marrow transplant (55%), and relapsed/refractory disease (73%). For those same scenarios, the majority noted the current practice was to "sometimes" or "usually" consult. Most respondents (92.6%) felt that palliative care should be consulted more frequently than they were currently being consulted.
Conclusions: Compared with the current practice for various pediatric oncology departments, palliative care was not consulted as often as oncologists desired. While barriers to palliative care consultation are outlined in the literature, exploration of how to address them as well as identification of barriers specific to oncologists who are in favor of palliative care consultation are not well-described. Further research exploring these specific barriers is necessary to understand the disconnect between oncologists' attitudes and palliative care consultation.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1097/MPH.0000000000002276 | DOI Listing |
J Pain Symptom Manage
January 2025
Section of Palliative Care and Medical Ethics, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA; Palliative Research Center, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA; School of Medicine, University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine, Pittsburgh, PA, USA.
Context: Specialty palliative care remains inaccessible for many with serious illness, especially in rural areas. Telehealth may be one solution.
Objectives: To describe how telehealth increases access to specialty palliative care, describe facilitators and barriers to its use, and summarize evidence of patient benefits.
J Pain Symptom Manage
January 2025
Lien Centre for Palliative Care, Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore; Programme in Health Services and Systems Research, Duke-NUS Medical School, Singapore.
Context: There has been growing interest in the role of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) as part of end-of-life care.
Objectives: This study prospectively examined the prevalence, predictors and outcomes of ingestible CAM use among cancer patients in their last year of life in Singapore.
Methods: This study (N=427) utilized data across 12 months (4 time points) prior to patient death.
J Pain Symptom Manage
January 2025
Cambia Palliative Care Center of Excellence at UW Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA; Division of Pulmonary, Critical Care, and Sleep Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, WA.
Context: Critically-ill patients and their families often experience communication challenges during their ICU stay and across transitions in care. An intervention using communication facilitators may help address these challenges.
Objectives: Using clinicians' perspectives, we identified facilitators and barriers to implementing a communication intervention.
J Pediatr Surg
December 2024
Massachusetts General Hospital, Mass General Brigham, Division of Pediatric Surgery, Department of Surgery, Boston, MA, USA; Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA.
Ir J Med Sci
January 2025
Department of Psychiatry, Trinity College Dublin, Trinity Centre for Health Sciences, Tallaght University Hospital, Tallaght, Dublin 24, D24 NR0A, Ireland.
Background: Cancer has adverse consequences for mental health, especially in women. Lack of awareness of services and stigma diminish access to psycho-oncology services.
Aims: To assess psychological distress and willingness to engage in multidisciplinary psycho-oncological services among cancer patients.
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