This study sought to compare the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Subscale (HADS-D) and Brief Edinburgh Depression Scale (BEDS) as case-finding tools of major depressive disorder in patients with advanced cancer in a palliative care service.

An observational study was performed which included patients with advanced cancer who attended the palliative care service at the National Institute of Cancer in Mexico. Patients were asked to fill out the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and BEDS and were then assessed by a psychiatrist to evaluate major depressive disorder (MDD) as per the DSM-5 criteria. The case-finding capability of each scale was determined using receiver operating characteristic curves, assessing the area under the curve (AUC) in comparison to the clinical diagnosis.

Eighty-nine patients were included; median age was 57 years, and 71% were female. Among these, 19 patients were diagnosed with MDD during the interview. When comparing the self-reported scales, BEDS had a better performance compared with HADS-D (AUC 0.8541 vs. 0.7665). Limitations include a heterogeneous population and a limited sample size.

The BEDS outperformed the HADS-D tool in discriminating patients with and without depression. A BEDS cutoff value of ≥5 is suggested as a case-finding score for depression in this population.

The objective of this study was to assess the psychosocial distress and associated factors in advanced cancer patients consulting at the outpatient Palliative Care Unit at the National Cancer Institute in Mexico City.

A retrospective study was conducted using electronic records (June 2015 to December 2016).

A total of 646 patients with advanced cancer during their first visit to the outpatient palliative care unit at the National Cancer Institute in Mexico were evaluated using the Distress Thermometer (DT) and ECOG performance status scores.

Overall, 62% were women, with a median age of 57 years, and married (54.8%). The most frequent diagnosis was gastrointestinal cancer (28.6%), and 38.9% had a functional performance status of ECOG 2. The median DT score was 4.0 (IQR = 2–6), with 56% reporting DT scores ≥4. The three most frequent problems ≥4 were sadness (82.6%), feeling weak (81.2%), worry (79.6%), and <4 were feeling weak (57.7%), fatigue (55.6%), and financial security (52.1%). The variables associated with distress according to the multiple logistic regression analysis were problems with housing (OR = 2.661, 95% CI = 1.538–4.602), sadness (OR = 2.533, 95% CI = 1.615–3.973), transportation (OR = 1.732, 95% CI = 1.157–2.591), eating (OR = 1.626, 95% CI = 1.093–2.417), nervousness (OR = 1.547, 95% CI = 1.014–2.360), and sleep (OR = 1.469, 95% CI = 1.980–2.203).

The principal factors were related to distress levels, housing problems, transportation issues, and emotional problems such as sadness, nervousness, lower functionality, and younger age. Therefore, psychosocial support is of considerable relevance in palliative care. These findings will help clinicians understand the distress of patients with advanced cancer in palliative care in Latin American countries.

Inflammation may contribute to the high prevalence of depressive symptoms seen in lung cancer. “Sickness behavior” is a cluster of symptoms induced by inflammation that are similar but distinct from depressive symptoms. The Sickness Behavior Inventory-Revised (SBI-R) was developed to measure sickness behavior. We hypothesized that the SBI-R would demonstrate adequate psychometric properties in association with inflammation.

Participants with stage IV lung cancer (n = 92) were evaluated for sickness behavior using the SBI-R. Concomitant assessments were made of depression (Patient Hospital Questionniare-9, Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale) and inflammation [C-reactive protein (CRP)]. Classical test theory (CTT) was applied and multivariate models were created to explain SBI-R associations with depression and inflammation. Factor Analysis was also used to identify the underlying factor structure of the hypothesized construct of sickness behavior. A longitudinal analysis was conducted for a subset of participants.

The sample mean for the 12-item SBI-R was 8.3 (6.7) with a range from 0 to 33. The SBI-R demonstrated adequate internal consistency with a Cronbach's coefficient of 0.85, which did not increase by more than 0.01 with any single-item removal. This analysis examined factor loadings onto a single factor extracted using the principle components method. Eleven items had factor loadings that exceeded 0.40. SBI-R total scores were significantly correlated with depressive symptoms (r = 0.78, p < 0.001) and CRP (r = 0.47, p < 0.001). Multivariate analyses revealed that inflammation and depressive symptoms explained 67% of SBI-R variance.

The SBI-R demonstrated adequate reliability and construct validity in this patient population with metastatic lung cancer. The observed findings suggest that the SBI-R can meaningfully capture the presence of sickness behavior and may facilitate a greater understanding of inflammatory depression.

This study reports the evaluation of the original 31-item Quality of Dying and Death Questionnaire (QODD) using a sample of caregivers of recently deceased older adults in China, and the validation of a shortened version (QODD-C) derived from the original scale.

The translation was performed using a forward and back method. The full scale was tested with 212 caregivers of decedents in four regions of China. Confirmatory factor analysis tested the model fit between the full Chinese version and the original conceptual model and generated the QODD-C. The psychometric analysis was performed to evaluate the QODD-C's internal consistency, content validity, construct validity, and discriminant validity.

A five-domain, 18-item QODD-C was identified with excellent internal consistency reliability (Cronbach's α = 0.933; split-half Pearson's value = 0.855). The QODD-C total score was significantly associated with constructs related to five domains. The caregiver's relationship with the decedent, the decedent's age at death, death reason, and death place was significantly associated with the QODD-C total score.

The QODD-C is a valid and reliable instrument for assessing the quality of dying and death among the Chinese populations.

Population aging has increased the prevalence of surrogate decision making in healthcare settings. However, little is known about factors contributing to the decision to become a surrogate and the surrogate medical decision-making process in general. We investigated how intrapersonal and social-contextual factors predicted two components of the surrogate decision-making process: individuals’ willingness to serve as a surrogate and their tendency to select various end-of-life treatments, including mechanical ventilation and palliative care options.

An online sample (N = 172) of adults made hypothetical surrogate decisions about end-of-life treatments on behalf of an imagined person of their choice, such as a parent or spouse. Using self-report measures, we investigated key correlates of willingness to serve as surrogate (e.g., decision-making confidence, willingness to collaborate with healthcare providers) and choice of end-of-life treatments.

Viewing service as a surrogate as a more typical practice in healthcare was associated with greater willingness to serve. Greater decision-making confidence, greater willingness to collaborate with patients’ physicians, and viewing intensive, life-sustaining end-of-life treatments (e.g., mechanical ventilation) as more widely accepted were associated with choosing more intensive end-of-life treatments.

The current study's consideration of both intrapersonal and social-contextual factors advances knowledge of two key aspects of surrogate decision making — the initial decision to serve as surrogate, and the surrogate's selection of various end-of-life treatment interventions. Providers can use information about the role of these factors to engage with surrogates in a manner that better facilitates their decision making. For instance, providers can be sensitive to potential cultural differences in surrogate decision-making tendencies or employing decision aids that bolster surrogates’ confidence in their decisions.

Desire for death (DfD) is a complex and multifactorial dimension of end-of-life experience. We aimed to evaluate the prevalence of DfD and its associations, arising within the setting of a tertiary home-based palliative care (PC) unit.

Retrospective analysis of all DfD entries registered in our anonymized database from October 2018 to April 2020.

Of the 163 patients anonymously registered in our database, 122 met entry criteria; 52% were male, the average age was 69 years old; 85% had malignancies, with a mean performance status (PPS) of 56%. The prevalence of DfD was 20%. No statistical differences were observed between patients with and without DfD regarding sex, age, marital status, religion, social support, prior PC or psychological follow-up, type of diagnosis, presence of advanced directives/living will, time since diagnosis and PC team's follow-up time. Statistically significant associations were found between higher PPS scores and DfD (OR = 0.96; 95% confidence interval (CI) [0.93–0.99]); Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale scores for drowsiness (OR = 4.05; 95% CI [1.42–11.57]), shortness of breath (OR = 3.35; 95% CI [1.09–10.31]), well-being (OR = 7.64; 95% CI [1.63–35.81]). DfD was associated with being depressed (OR = 19.24; 95% CI [3.09–+inf]); feeling anxious (OR = 11.11; 95% CI [2.51–49.29]); HADS anxiety subscale ≥11 (OR = 25.0; 95% CI [2.10–298.29]); will-to-live (OR = 39.53; 95% CI [4.85–321.96]). Patients feeling a burden were more likely to desire death (OR = 14.67; 95% CI [1.85–116.17]), as well as those who were not adapted to the disease (OR = 4.08; 95% CI [1.30–12.84]). In multivariate regression analyses predicting DfD, three independent factors emerged: higher PPS scores were associated with no DfD (aOR = 0.95; 95% CI [0.91–0.99]), while the sense of being a burden (aOR = 12.82; 95% CI [1.31–125.16]) and worse well-being (aOR = 7.72; 95% CI [1.26–47.38]) predicted DfD.

Prevalence of DfD was 20% and consistent with previous Portuguese evidence on DfD in PC inpatients. Both physical and psychosocial factors contribute to a stronger DfD.

Studies in countries where assisted dying is legal show that bereaved people express concern over the potential for social disapproval and social stigma because of the manner of death. There are indications that voluntary assisted dying is judged as less acceptable if the deceased is younger. A vignette-based experiment was used to determine whether public stigma (i.e., negative emotional reactions and desired social distance) and expected grief symptoms are higher for conjugally bereaved people through voluntary assisted dying (vs. long-term illness), when the deceased is a young adult (vs. older adult).

A 2 × 2 randomized factorial design was conducted with 164 Australian adults (130 women, 34 men, Mage = 37.69 years). Each participant was randomized online to read one of four vignettes and completed measures of anger, fear, prosocial emotions, desire for social distance, and expectations of grief symptomatology.

A multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was conducted. Death at a young age (28 years) was significantly associated with stronger negative emotional reactions of fear ($\eta _p^2 = 0.04$, P = 0.048) and anger ($\eta _p^2 = 0.06$, P = 0.010). There were no differences in outcomes associated with the mode of death, nor was there an interaction between mode of death and age group.

Concerns that voluntary assisted dying elicits public stigma appear unfounded. The fact that participants reported significantly higher anger and fear in response to bereaved people experiencing loss at a younger (vs. older) age, irrespective of cause of death, indicates that young people who lose their spouse might benefit from additional support.

We sought to characterize patients’ preferences for the role of religious and spiritual (R&S) beliefs and practices during cancer treatment and describe the R&S resources desired by patients during the perioperative period.

A cross-sectional survey was administered to individuals who underwent cancer-directed surgery. Data on demographics and R&S beliefs/preferences were collected and analyzed.

Among 236 participants, average age was 58.8 (SD = 12.10) years; the majority were female (76.2%), white (94.1%), had a significant other or spouse (60.2%), and were breast cancer survivors (43.6%). Overall, more than one-half (55.9%) of individuals identified themselves as being religious, while others identified as only spiritual (27.9%) or neither (16.2%). Patients who identified as religious wanted R&S integrated into their care more often than patients who were only spiritual or neither (p < 0.001). Nearly half of participants (49.6%) wanted R&S resources when admitted to the hospital including the opportunity to speak with an R&S leader (e.g., rabbi; 72.1%), R&S texts (64.0%), and journaling materials (54.1%). Irrespective of R&S identification, 68.0% of patients did not want their physician to engage with them about R&S topics.

Access to R&S resources is important during cancer treatment, and incorporating R&S into cancer care may be especially important to patients that identify as religious. R&S needs should be addressed as part of the cancer care plan.

Despite the increased focus on improving advance care planning (ACP) in African Americans through community partnerships, little published research focused on the role of the African American church in this effort. This study examines parishioner perceptions and beliefs about the role of the church in ACP and end-of-life care (EOLC).

Qualitative interviews were completed with 25 church members (parishioners n = 15, church leader n = 10). The coding of data entailed a direct content analysis approach incorporating team experts for final themes.

Seven themes emerged: (1) church role on end-of-life, (2) advocacy for health and well-being, (3) health literacy in EOLC, (4) lay health training on ACP and EOLC, (5) church recognized as a trusted source, (6) use of church ministries to sustain programs related to ACP and EOLC, and (7) community resources for EOLC needs.

The church has a central role in the African American Community. These findings suggest that involving African American churches in ACP and EOLC training can have a positive effect on facilitating planning and care during illness, dying, and death for their congregants.

To describe the feasibility of a meaning-centered group psychotherapy (MCGP) adaptation in a sample of Portuguese cancer patients.

The study was carried out according to four steps: 1st — Transcultural adaptation and validation (focus groups); 2nd — Preliminary study with MCGP original version (to test its feasibility); 3rd — Adaptation of MCGP original version to a 4-session version (and internal pilot study); and 4th — Pilot exploratory trial (MCGP-4 session version), implemented between January 1, 2018 and December 31, 2019. Inclusion criteria were >18 years, psychological complaints, and difficulty to adapt to cancer. Allocation was according to participants’ preference: MCGP vs. care as usual (CAU). Primary outcomes were: MCGP adapted version improved quality of life (QoL) and spiritual well-being; secondary outcomes were improvement of depression, anxiety, and distress. Assessments were done at baseline (T1) and 1 month after (T2), with self-report socio-demographic and clinical questionnaires, Distress Thermometer (DT), McGill Quality of Life Questionnaire (MQOL), Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy — Spiritual Well-Being Scale (FACIT-Sp-12), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and its subscales (HADS — HADS-D, HADS-A).

In the 1st step, and through focus groups, the manual was reformulated and tested. The preliminary study (2nd step) with MCGP original version showed a high number of dropouts which could jeopardize the study and, after reframing the sessions content, MCGP was adapted to a 4-session version, and its feasibility was tested by an internal pilot study (3rd step). The pilot exploratory trial (4th step) had 91 participants. Most socio-demographic and clinical characteristics between the groups (51: MCGP; 40: CAU) had no statistically significant differences. A comparison between the two groups at T2 showed that the MCGP group scored significantly higher in the general (U = 552.00, P < 0.001), and existential (U = 727.50, P = 0.018) domains and total score (U = 717.50, P = 0.015) of QoL, and CAU presented statistical higher levels in DT (U = 608.50, P = 0.001). Comparing the groups between T1 and T2, the MCGP group had a statistically significant improvement in the general (Z = −3.67, P < 0.001) and psychosocial (Z = −2.89, P = 0.004) domains and total score (Z = −2.71, P = 0.007) of QoL, and a statistically significant decrease in DT (Z = −2.40, P = 0.016). In terms of group effects, the MCGP group presented increased general (b = 1.42, P < 0.001, η2p = 0.179), and support (b = 0.80, P = 0.045, η2p = 0.048) domains and total score (b = 0.81, P = 0.013, η2p = 0.073) of QoL (small to elevated dimensions), and decreased levels of depression (b = −1.14, P = 0.044, η2p = 0.048), and distress (b = −1.38, P = 0.001, η2p = 0.127) (small to medium dimensions), compared with CAU. At T2, participants who attended ≥3 sessions (n = 38) had a statistically significant higher score in the general domain (U = 130.50, P = 0.009) of QoL, comparing with those who attended 1 or 2 sessions (n = 13).

This study supports the benefits of an MCGP adapted version in improving QoL and psychologic well-being. More studies are necessary to address the limitations of this pilot exploratory trial, as its small sample size.

The goal of palliative and supportive care is to improve patients’ quality of life (QoL). Patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) are the gold standard for the assessment of QoL and symptoms; however, when self-reporting is complicated, PROMs are often substituted with proxy-reported outcome measures, such as clinician-reported outcome measures. The objective of this study was to assess the validity and reliability of the Japanese version of the Integrated Palliative care Outcome Scale (IPOS) for staff (IPOS-Staff).

This multicenter, cross-sectional observational study was conducted concurrently with the validation of the IPOS for patients (IPOS-Patient). Japanese adult patients with cancer and their staff were recruited. We assessed the characteristics of the patients and staff members, missing values, prevalence, and total IPOS scores. For the analysis of criterion validity, intra-rater, and inter-rater reliability, we calculated intraclass correlations (ICCs).

One hundred and forty-three patients completed the IPOS-Patient, and 79 medical staff members completed the IPOS-Staff. The most common missing values from IPOS-Staff were Family Anxiety (3.5%) and Sharing Feelings (3.5%). Over half of the patients scored themselves moderate or worse for Poor Mobility, Anxiety, and Family Anxiety, while staff members scored patients moderate or worse for Weakness, Anxiety, and Family Anxiety. For criterion validity (patient–staff agreement) as well as intra-rater and inter-rater reliability, ICCs ranged from 0.114 (Sharing Feelings) to 0.826 (Nausea), 0.720 (Anxiety) to 0.933 (Nausea), and −0.038 (Practical Problems) to 0.830 (Nausea), respectively.

The IPOS-Staff is easy to respond to; it has fair validity and reliability for physical items but poor for psycho-social items. By defining the context and objectives of its use and interpretation, the IPOS-Staff can be a useful tool for measuring outcomes in adult patients with cancer who cannot complete self-evaluations.

On October 10, 2020, the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center Supportive Care Service hosted their first-ever United States (US) World Hospice and Palliative Care Day (WHPCD) Celebration. The purpose of this article is to describe the US inaugural event in alignment with the broader goals of WHPCD and provide lessons learned in anticipation of the second annual conference to be held on October 5–6, 2021.

Description of the inaugural event in the context of COVID-19 and WHPCD, co-planning conference team reflection, and attendee survey responses.

The Worldwide Hospice Palliative Care Alliance initially launched WHPCD in 2005 as an annual unified day of action to celebrate and support hospice and palliative care around the world. The US-based innovative virtual conference featured 23 interprofessional hospice and palliative care specialists and patient and family caregiver speakers across nine diverse sessions addressing priorities at the intersection of COVID-19, social injustice, and the global burden of serious health-related suffering. Two primary aims guided the event: community building and wisdom sharing. Nearly 270 registrants from at least 16 countries and one dozen states across the US joined the free program focused on both personal and professional development.

Unlike many other academic conferences and professional gatherings that were relegated to online forums due to pandemic-related restrictions, the US WHPCD Celebration was intentionally established to create a virtual coming together for collective reflection on the barriers and facilitators of palliative care delivery amid vast societal change. The goal to ensure a globally relevant and culturally inclusive agenda will continue to draw increased participation at an international level during future annual events. Finally, the transparent and respectful sharing of palliative care team experiences in the year preceding the conference established a safe environment for both individual expression and scholarly discussion.

This study investigated relationships among spirituality, hope, and overall quality of life in Muslim women with breast cancer in Malaysia.

A cross-sectional descriptive design with a convenience sample of 145 Malay patients was used. The mediating role of hope in the relationship between spirituality and quality of life as well as the moderating effect of education level on the spirituality hope link were examined.

Participants with higher self-reported spirituality reported more hope (b = 6.345, p < 0.001) and higher levels of quality of life (b = 1.065, p < 0.001). Higher educational attainment weakened relationships between spirituality and hope (b = −1.460, p < 0.001).

The role of advanced education in contributing to lessened hope in relation to spirituality emphasizes the importance of skilled and personalized spiritual counseling in the respective socio-cultural religious context.

Hope promotes oncology patients’ adaptability to their illness, regardless of the stage of cancer. This study aimed to determine the prevalence of hope in a sample of end-of-life patients and to investigate the possible relationships between hope and a set of clinical and psychosocial measures.

Three hundred and fifty end-of-life oncology patients, with a presumed life expectancy of 4 months or less and a Karnofsky Performance Status (KPS) of 50 or lower, were administered the Italian validated versions of a set of rating scales during their first consultation with a psychologist. This included the Herth Hope Index (HHI), Patient Dignity Inventory (PDI), Demoralization Scale (DS), Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS), Functional Assessment of Chronic Illness Therapy (FACIT-Sp), and the Visual Analogue Scale for pain (VAS).

On average, the sample scored between moderate and high on the HHI and the average level of spirituality was high. However, most patients had clinically relevant anxious and depressive symptomatology and high levels of demoralization. Other than the pain scale, the total HHI score significantly correlated with the total scores of all rating scales and their subscales, as well as with the measure of personal religious practice. The “Meaning” FACIT-Sp subscale was found to be the main predictor of hope.

Since hope represents a core need and a tool for patients dealing with their illness, it is essential to implement stage-specific and realistic hope-facilitating interventions and support patients in their search for meaning, which promotes spiritual well-being and appears relevant in fostering hope.

A sense of security is important in palliative home care. Yet, knowledge about which components contribute most to feeling secure from the patients’ and family caregivers’ perspectives, especially since the introduction of specialist palliative home care, is sparse. The goal of the current study was to determine the key components contributing to a sense of security and how they relate to each other as experienced by patients and family caregivers in specialist and generalist palliative home care.

The current sub-study, as part of a larger study, was performed in different regions in Germany. Palliative care patients and family caregivers of at least 18 years of age, being cared for at home were interviewed using semi-structured interview guides following a three-factor model and analyzed by using a combined quantitative-qualitative-content approach.

One hundred and ninty-seven patients and 10 carers completed interviews between December 2017 and April 2019. The majority of patients were diagnosed with an oncological disease. Sense of security was mentioned particularly often suggesting its high relevance. We identified nine subcategories that were all mentioned more frequently by specialist than generalist palliative home care recipients in the following order of priority and relation: (i) patient-centeredness: availability, provision of information/education, professional competence, patient empowerment, and trust (ii) organizational work: comprehensive responsibility, external collaboration, and internal cooperation, and (iii) direct communication.

The work of specialist palliative home care services in particular was perceived as very effective and beneficial. Our findings confirm a previously developed three-factor model allowing for generalizability and revealed that availability was most important for improving the sense of security for effective palliative home care.

Advanced cancer patients who are parents of minor children experience heightened psychosocial distress. Oncology social workers (OSWs) are essential providers of psychosocial support to parents with advanced cancer. Yet, little is known about the experiences and approaches of OSWs in addressing these patients’ unique needs. The purpose of this study was to characterize the attitudes, practice behaviors, and training experiences of OSWs who provide psychosocial care for advanced cancer patients with minor children.

Forty-one OSWs participated in a cross-sectional survey addressing multiple facets of their psychosocial care for parents with advanced cancer. The five assessed domains of psychosocial support were communication support, emotional support, household support, illness and treatment decision-making support, and end-of-life planning.

Participants reported greatest confidence in counseling patients on communication with children about illness and providing support to co-parents about parenting concerns. OSWs reported less confidence in counseling parents on end-of-life issues and assisting families with non-traditional household structures. The majority of participants reported needing more time in their clinical practice to sufficiently address parents’ psychosocial needs. Nearly 90% of participants were interested in receiving further training on the care of parents with advanced cancer.

To improve the care of parents with advanced cancer, it is critical to understand how the psychosocial oncology workforce perceives its clinical practice needs. Study findings suggest an opportunity for enhanced training, particularly with respect to end-of-life needs and in response to the changing household structure of American families.

This study was conducted to determine the relationship between religious attitudes of Muslim women with gynecologic cancer and mental adjustment to cancer.

Designed as a descriptive relational study, this study was conducted with 123 patients with gynecologic cancer. A personal information form, prepared in accordance with the literature, the Religious Attitude Scale (RAS), and the Mental Adjustment to Cancer Scale (MACS) were used as data collection tools. The data were assessed using descriptive statistics, Pearson's correlation analysis, and linear regression analysis.

A positive correlation was determined between the RAS score and the fighting spirit subscale of the MACS (r = 0.65, p < 0.001). A negative correlation was found between the helplessness/hopelessness and anxious preoccupation subscales of the MACS and the RAS score (r = −0.40, p < 0.001; r = −0.30, p < 0.001, respectively).

The present results are helpful in understanding the influence of religious attitudes on the mental adjustment to gynecologic cancer patients. The results can serve as a reference for nursing education and clinical healthcare practice. Palliative healthcare providers can participate in improved care by recognizing spiritual needs and by advocating for attention to spiritual needs as a routine part of cancer care.

In recent years, the use of both molecular targeting agents (MTAs) and immune-checkpoint inhibitors (ICIs) tend to occupy important positions in systemic anticancer therapy (SACT). The objective of this study is to describe the predictors of SACT include both MTAs and ICIs near the end of life (EOL) and the effect on EOL care in patients with advanced cancer.

We analyzed all patients who died of advanced cancer from August 2016 to August 2019, and we analyzed the survival time of patients who underwent anticancer agents excluded due to the loss of information about the last administration of SACT. The primary endpoint of this study was to identify predictors during the last administration of SACT near EOL.

In a multivariate analysis, the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group performance status (ECOG-PS) (ORs 33.781) was significantly related factors within 14 days of death from the last administration of SACT. Age (ORs 0.412), ECOG-PS (ORs 11.533), primary cancer site of upper GI cancers (ORs 2.205), the number of comorbidities (ORs 0.207), MTAs (ORs 3.139), and ICIs (ORs 3.592) were significantly related factors within 30 days of death. The median survival time (MST) of patients with PS 3–4 was 29 days, while that of patients with both PS 0–2 was 76 days. The prevalence rate of delirium with MTAs was 17.5%, which was significantly lower than that of patients without it (31.8%). The prevalence rate of the mean dose of opioids in patients with ICIs was 97.9 mg/day, which was significantly higher than that of patients without it (44.9 mg/day).

Age, ECOG-PS, primary cancer site, the number of comorbidities, MTAs, and ICIs use were significant associated with SACT near EOL. Information on these factors may aid clinical decision making in referral to palliative care institutes.

With over two million deaths and almost 100 million confirmed cases, the COVID-19 pandemic has caused a “tsunami of suffering.” Health care workers, including palliative care workers, have been severely impacted. This study explores how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted palliative care workers around the world and describes the coping strategies they have adopted to face their specific situation.

We conducted a qualitative analysis of written, unstructured comments provided by respondents to a survey of IAHPC members between May and June 2020. Free text was exported to MAX QDA, and a thematic analysis was performed by reading the comments and developing a coding frame.

Seventy-seven palliative care workers from 41 countries submitted at least one written comment, resulting in a data corpus of 10,694 words and a total of 374 coded comments. Eight main themes are emerged from the analysis: palliative care development, workforce impact, work reorganization, palliative care reconceptualization, economic and financial impacts, increased risk, emotional impact, and coping strategies.

The pandemic has had a huge impact on palliative care workers including their ability to work and their financial status. It has generated increased workloads and placed them in vulnerable positions that affect their emotional well-being, resulting in distress and burnout. Counseling and support networks provide important resilience-building buffers. Coping strategies such as team and family support are important factors in workers’ capacity to adapt and respond. The pandemic is changing the concept and praxis of palliative care. Government officials, academia, providers, and affected populations need to work together to develop, and implement steps to ensure palliative care integration into response preparedness plans so as not to leave anyone behind, including health workers.

To assess the effectiveness of home-based palliative care (HBPC) on reducing hospital visits and whether HBPC lowered health care cost.

We searched six bibliographic databases (Embase (Ovid); Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials; Medline (Ovid); PubMed; Web of Science Core Collection; and, CINAHL) until February 2019 and performed a narrative synthesis of our findings.

Of the 1,426 identified references, 21 articles based on 19 unique studies met our inclusion criteria, which involved 92,000 participants. In both oncological and non-oncological patients, HBPC consistently reduced the number of hospital visits and their length, as well as hospitalization costs and overall health care costs. Even though home-treated patients consumed more outpatient resources, a higher saving in the hospital costs counterbalanced this. The reduction in overall health care costs was most noticeable for study periods closer to death, with greater reductions in the last 2 months, last month, and last two weeks of life.

Stakeholders should recognize HBPC as an intervention that decreases patient care costs at end of life and therefore health care providers should assess the preferences of patients nearing the end-of-life to identify those who will benefit most from HBPC.