The charity Together for Short Lives has launched a campaign to encourage nurses to consider a role in children's palliative care in the voluntary sector, to prevent any further reduction in services for this already vulnerable group.
We read with interest the article titled “A “Good Death” for Children with Cardiac Disease” by Moynihan et al. [1] The authors found that parents were less likely to perceive a “good death” when there was a lack of advanced care planning, poor pain…
Content: The use of recreational, expressive, and integrative methods of providing supportive care to patients and families coping with cancer is growing in cancer treatment settings. One such method is animal-assisted interventions (AAI). From the…
Background/aim: Pediatric Palliative Care (PPC) in hospitals mainly focuses on the parents and siblings of children suffering from a life limiting disease. However, most grandparents are also highly involved in the caring of the child and require…
Aims: This feasibility study aimed to systematically identify and address the support needs of parents of children with life-limiting illnesses and to assess whether the systematic approach was acceptable and relevant to parents. Method(s): The CSNAT…
BACKGROUND: South Asians are one of the fastest growing populations in the US. Family based decision making is common among this population. Little is known about their knowledge and attitudes towards hospice use. OBJECTIVE(S): This study explored US…
OBJECTIVES: A key aim of palliative care is to improve the quality-of-life of people with a life-threatening illness. Occupational therapists are well positioned to contribute to this aim due to their broad range of interventions, client-centeredness…
BACKGROUND: Legacy building interventions are used in pediatric healthcare settings to help families cope with difficult healthcare experiences and typically reserved for intentional use at or near the end of a child's life. However, little is known…
Background: Last Aid Courses (LAC) for adults have been established in 21 countries in Europe, Australia and America to improve the public discussion about death and dying and to empower people to participate in end-of-life care provision. In 2018,…
Background More young adults with life-limiting conditions are surviving into adulthood needing adult palliative care (Gibson- Smith, Jarvis, Norman et al., 2021). The evidence on appropriate service models is sparse (Clark & Fasciano, 2015. Am J…
The loss of a close friend or relative is always an ordeal. When this loved one is a baby, born or even unborn, a number of specific aspects have been reported by parents and researchers. The specificities of perinatal mourning have been…
Introduction: Subcutaneous hydration (hypodermoclysis) and drug administration is a widely used method of analgesic therapy in adult palliative care medicine. Very little is known about its use in neonatal medicine. Evidence-based guidelines do not…
Objectives: In the modern pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) physicians are often faced with the need to interrupt life-sustaining treatment (LST) and to allow children to die when no further treatment options are available. Consequently, the…
BACKGROUND:: There is few literature on the difficulties and different meanings of gastrostomy tubes (GST) for parents of children with palliative needs, and what specific palliative care teams contribute to this process. AIM:: To explore the process…
Background/Objectives: As cancer care has improved, so has the understanding that children with cancer are at risk for psychological distress. The American Academy of Pediatrics has highlighted the importance of addressing these concerns. Our study…
Objectives To see if a network Palliative Care Study day increases knowledge of participants. Method This was the first paediatric palliative care network study day run in the region. 20 doctors (both consultants and those in training) participated.…
The prevalence of Pediatric Palliative Care (PPC) programs for children significantly increased over the past two decades. In more recent years, however, evidence suggests a plateau in program expansion and service reach, despite the current reality…
Background: Case management is a subject of interest within pediatric palliative care. Detailed descriptions of the content of this type of case management are lacking. We aim to describe the contents of care provided, utilization of different…
Background: Paediatric Palliative Care (PPC) has undergone rapid growth in Portugal, where there are over 7800 children with life-limiting conditions. This is a complex experience for families due to the ongoing threat and vulnerability caused by the…
Introduction: Being responsive to end-users is essential to good care. Limited in-depth exploration of parental perspectives on care received by children over the course of serious illness has hindered the development of process measures to evaluate…
Pediatric shared decision-making (SDM) is a fundamental part of family-centered care. Pediatric palliative care (PPC) is one of the more difficult fields for healthcare providers when choosing to utilize SDM. However, to our knowledge, there are…
Background: Systematic symptom assessment is not a standard of care in children with cancer. Many well-known symptom assessment tools are lengthy or difficult to integrate into a daily pediatric palliative care practice. We created a series of brief…
Aims & Objectives: To develop three linked projects to enumerate, reflect upon and identify ways to improve the experience of children with life limiting conditions (LLC) admitted to PICU without previous contact with palliative care services or…
BACKGROUND: Paediatric complex chronic conditions (CCCs) are life-limiting conditions requiring paediatric palliative care, which, in Belgium, is provided through paediatric liaison teams (PLTs). Like the number of children and adolescents with these…
Objectives: 1. Describe patterns of pediatric palliative care and care disparities in neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) patients and families hospitalized in the Deep South (Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi). 2. Describe implications for…
Background: This article examines the legal status and level of accessibility to perinatal palliative care (PPC) in Poland, with a focus on the number of services provided and the number of parents receiving PPC services. Material(s) and Method(s):…
Pediatric advance care planning seeks to ensure end-of-life care conforming to the patients/their families' preferences. To expand our knowledge of advance care planning and "medical orders for life-sustaining treatment" (MOLST) in pediatric…
Background: Advanced care planning (ACP) is recommended for people with cystic fibrosis (CF). To date, a CF-specific consensus statement that would help CF care teams incorporate ACP into clinical practice has not been developed. Additional research…
Purpose of reviewThis article reviews the current literature on psychosocial care of children with cancer with particular focus on evidence-based standards of care, including developments in systematic distress screening, utilization of…
Background: Cancer remains the leading medical cause of death in children. Ensuring quality of life should be a priority, but it may be difficult to stop treatments, particularly in settings where palliative care is scarce. Little is known about how…
In paediatric palliative care (PPC), parents are confronted with increasing caregiving demands. More children are cared for at home, and the need for PPC of children is lengthened due to technical and medical improvements. Therefore, a clear…
Objectives To identify gaps in SPPC provision at a patient and service level at the tertiary centre, local children's hospice and the region, compared to national frameworks and standards. Specialist paediatric palliative care (SPPC) aims to improve…
Objective To describe the development and implementation of a 1-year 'Hybrid' Pediatric Palliative Care (PPC) Fellowship, which includes both clinical and online learning to train paediatricians as specialists and leaders in paediatric palliative…
Background/Objectives: Palliative care for Pediatric cancer patients and their families includes the relief of symptom and improvement of quality of life at any and all stages of disease. There care are most effectively provided by an…
Objective: To characterize cases of children admitted to the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit of a tertiary university hospital who died in the period ranging from January 01, 2012 to July 31, 2014, and who required palliative care and/or were subjected…
CONTEXT: Losing a child is the most burdensome event parents can experience involving risks of developing anxiety and depression. OBJECTIVES: To investigate anxiety and depression in bereaved parents during their child's life-limiting illness and…
Paediatric palliative care (PPC) endeavours to alleviate the suffering and improve the quality of life of children with serious illnesses and their families. In the past two decades since WHO defined PPC and called for its inclusion in paediatric…
