International News:
Deaf and dying: How a volunteer team brings palliative care comfort through communication
ONTARIO | The Ottawa Citizen – 25 December 2016 – Monica Elaine Campbell had with palliative care was to help a woman who lost her ability to speak to throat cancer. This experience got Campbell thinking about the communication needs of people who are deaf and hard of hearing like herself. Conversations on experiences on death and dying led Campbell and her friend, sign language interpreter Christine Wilson, to start up the Ottawa Deaf Palliative Care Team, a group of volunteers who provide end-of-life care care for the deaf and hard of hearing and their families. Since 2009, the team has helped inform and console the deaf and hard of hearing, breaking though their sense of isolation at the mist frightening and challenging time of their lives. https://goo.gl/W0ZDVM
All he wants is to die in his native Cuba
INDIANA | The Indianapolis Star – 27 December 2016 – Since Lazaro Blanco Garcia arrived at Key West, Florida in 1980, he has not returned to his native Cuba for these 37 years. When told the prostate cancer he had been suffering from for the past 11 years could not be treated anymore, his final wish was to go home to Cuba. His doctor, Pablo Bedano, said “from a palliative treatment standpoint, I’m sure that they will be able to provide just as good care there as they would here.” Majority of Garcia’s treatment will consist of pain control and end-of-life care and no more of futile cancer treatments that could weaken him. https://goo.gl/IBRJHX
Specialist publications:
Ensuring quality in online palliative care resources
CANCERS | Online – 13 December 2016 – Evidence and information is used by health professionals in clinical practice and in developing their professional knowledge, by policy makers in decision making, and is sought by health consumers to help them manage their health needs and assess their options. Increasingly, this evidence and information is being disseminated and sought through online channels and clinicians, patients, community members and decision makers are able to find out more about palliative care and end-of-life care. Although research driven improvements in prevention and treatment have improved mortality rates within cancer, disease progression means that many patients will still have palliative care needs. Being able to access high quality palliative care resources is an essential part of integrated cancer care. https://goo.gl/c1RC98
Rural long-term care nurses’ knowledge of palliative care
ONLINE JOURNAL OF RURAL NURSING & HEALTH CARE, 2016;16(2):141-167. The purpose of this study was to examine rural nurses’ knowledge of palliative care for end of life patients in long term care facilities. Although the study sample scored below 50%, registered nurses were more knowledgeable than licensed practical nurses on many of the items on the Palliative Care Knowledge Test. This study supports that the total years practiced in long term care does not affect the knowledge on the Palliative Care Knowledge Test. Nurses cannot practice what they do not know. Nurses who lack knowledge about the philosophy and principles of palliative care may lower the quality of end of life care for patients in long term care facilities. An evaluation of the knowledge level of nurses for palliative care is an important first step in instituting an educational intervention. https://goo.gl/fwFXmW
Cracking open death: Death conversations in primary care
JOURNAL OF PRIMARY HEALTH CARE | Online – 21 December 2016 – General practice in New Zealand has suffered encroachments on the traditional cradle-to-grave model of care over the last two decades, with steadily diminishing involvement in the beginnings and endings of life. Yet general practitioners (GPs), particularly GPs working in small and rural areas, remain grounded in the communities they serve, attuned to the flux of their patients’ life course. They are well placed to engage with sensitive issues such as death, based on the foundation of relationships built on trust that have developed over time. The ease of death conversations may be facilitated by taking a family-centred approach, using community organisations and settings, and harnessing conversation entry points provided by the media. https://goo.gl/lEVDpo
Advances in Hospice and Palliative Care in Japan: A Review Paper
Supported by national policies, palliative care in Japan has developed essentially in the oncology field. This review summarizes updates from two previous reviews, and focuses on major palliative care settings, specialty, national associations, education, and research on palliative care in Japan. Palliative care in Japan has rapidly progressed in clinical, academic, educational, and administrative areas, especially since the Cancer Control Act. However, Japan has many challenges to advancing palliative care further. Clinically, Japan needs to develop a structure for palliative care in the community, and strategies to integrate palliative care not only with oncology earlier in the disease trajectory, but also with non-cancer disciplines such as cardiology, pulmonology, neurology, nephrology, internal medicine, and critical care. https://goo.gl/dkkD4p