title: Issues in pediatric palliative care: understanding families.
abstract: While family-centred care has always been part of the rhetoric of hospice and palliative care, few models have been developed that successfully integrate care of the caregivers into the overall schema. Systematic analyses of interventions have failed to produce any demonstrable benefit to families arising from the modern practice of palliative care. This alarming finding constitutes the greatest challenge for the 21st century. Pediatric palliative care may have much to teach in its approach to family care. Family-focused grief therapy is one model, used with both adolescent and adult families, that has promise for the field. The time has surely arrived for palliative medicine to focus on family-based research.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, New York, New York, USA.
authors.forename: Abraham S
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Bartell
authors.forename: David W
authors.initials: DW
authors.lastname: Kissane
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002423:Cause of Death; D002648:Child; D002675:Child, Preschool; D003142:Communication; D003220:Conflict, Psychological; D005190:Family / Q000523:psychology*; D005196:Family Therapy / Q000458:organization & administration*; D006117:Grief; D006301:Health Services Needs and Demand; D006302:Health Services Research; D006801:Humans; D007223:Infant; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D008016:Life Change Events; D017146:Models, Organizational; D017063:Outcome Assessment, Health Care; D010166:Palliative Care / Q000458:organization & administration* / Q000523:psychology; D018802:Patient-Centered Care / Q000458:organization & administration*; D010372:Pediatrics / Q000458:organization & administration*; D010686:Philosophy, Medical; D011340:Problem Solving; D024382:Professional Role; D012944:Social Support; D014481:United States / Q000453:epidemiology