Subject
Attitude Of Health Personnel; Cancer Palliative Therapy; Childhood Cancer; Communication Barrier; Communication Barriers; Critical Illness/nu [nursing]; Palliative Care/mt [methods]; Parental Attitude; Physician-patient Relations; Article; Cancer Mortality; Cancer Patient; Cancer Therapy; Child; Critical Illness/px [psychology]; Disease Management; Dying; Empathy; Female; Human; Humans; Interpersonal Communication; Medical Expert; Oncologist; Palliative Care/px [psychology]; Parent-child Relations; Parents/px [psychology]; Pediatrician; Psychologist; Quality Of Health Care; Self Defense; Structured Interview
Description
INTRODUCTION: Adequate communication by medical personnel is especially important at certain points during the treatment of childhood cancer patients. AIM: To investigate the timing and manner of communication with parents concerning the introduction of palliative care in pediatric oncology. METHOD: Structured interviews, containing 14 questions, were carried out with physicians working in pediatric oncology (n = 22). Codes were generated inductively with the aid of Atlas.ti 6.0 software. RESULTS: Interviews show a tendency of a one-step transition to palliative care following curative therapy. Another expert is usually involved in communication, most likely a psychologist. Regarding communication, there are expressions utilized or avoided, such as expressing clarity, self-defense and empathy. The communication of death and dying was the most contradictory. CONCLUSION: This was the first investigation regarding communication in pediatric palliative care in Hungary. Our results show that a modern perspective of palliative communication is present, but necessitates more time to become entrenched. Orv Hetil. 2017; 158(30): 1175-1181.