BACKGROUND: Although pediatric hospice care is commonly accepted as a beneficial intervention, the incremental advantage over end-of-life care delivered without engaging hospice remains unknown. The primary objective of this study was to describe…
Background Elevated distress has been well documented among parents of children with cancer. Family systems theories suggest that cancer-related stressors and parental distress have the potential to affect child-rearing practices, but this topic has…
Broaching conversations about goals of care can be difficult for clinicians. Presently, the communication strategies used by pediatric oncologists to approach goals of care conversations are not well understood. We recorded disease re-evaluation…
BACKGROUND: Rhabdomyosarcomas (RMS) of the nasolabial fold can be difficult to manage surgically due to functional and cosmetic limitations. Therefore, brachytherapy (BT) has been proposed to improve local control while limiting the volume of…
BACKGROUND: The influence of socio-economic and religious background on decisions made by parents of children with incurable cancer regarding DNR orders is not fully understood. PROCEDURE: A retrospective analysis of medical charts of patients who…
BACKGROUND: We studied the relation between unrelieved symptoms in terminally ill children and the psychological well-being in the bereaved parents 4-9 years after their loss. PROCEDURE: We contacted parents in Sweden who had lost a child to a…
BACKGROUND: Little is known about how well family members accurately represent adolescents when making EOL decisions on their behalf. This study reports on surveys given to adolescents with cancer and their parents as part of a larger study…
BACKGROUND: Pediatric palliative care (PPC) for oncology patients improves quality of life and the likelihood of goal-concordant care. However, barriers to involvement exist. OBJECTIVES: We aimed to increase days between PPC consult and death for…
The loss of a child is considered the hardest moment in a parent's life. Studies addressing length of survival under pediatric palliative care are rare. The aim of this study was to improve a survival prediction model for children in palliative care,…
