Subject
Child; Humans; England; Health Services Needs and Demand; Pilot Projects; Nurse's Role; Evidence-Based Medicine; Nursing Assessment; Nursing Evaluation Research; Benchmarking; adolescent; Preschool; PedPal Lit; infant; Practice Guidelines; retrospective studies; Documentation/standards; Patient Care Team/organization & administration; Outcome and Process Assessment (Health Care)/organization & administration; Nursing Audit; Palliative Care/organization & administration; Pediatric Nursing/organization & administration; Critical Pathways/organization & administration; Nursing Records/standards; Total Quality Management/organization & administration
Description
In most western societies the death of a child is a rare occurrence. When it does occur, it typically takes place after a period of intensive and often prolonged treatment. In light of the relative infrequency of these events in clinical practice, ensuring that all dying children and their families receive consistent and appropriate care remains a challenge. A retrospective audit of documentation of care for dying children in two paediatric units in the north-west of England illustrated that the care provided was not always documented consistently. This paper highlights work currently underway to develop an integrated care pathway for the care of the dying child based on the Liverpool Care Pathway (LCP). The aim of this work is to facilitate the delivery and recording of optimum care for all dying children and their families.
2006