Noncancer palliative care: the lost pieces in an acute care setting in Taiwan.
Little is known about the picture of patients receiving palliative care in the acute care setting. The study was conducted in a medical center in Taiwan. Cancer palliative care (CPC) was performed for terminal do-not-resuscitate (DNR) patients with advanced cancers. Noncancer palliative care (NCPC) was performed for DNR patients who did not fulfill the criteria of CPC. Of the 1379 consecutive admissions, 258 patients were identified, with 193 (74.8%) requiring NCPC and 65 (25.2%) requiring CPC. The NCPC patients were older and had lower Charlson comorbidity index (2.6 vs 8.6, P < .001) than CPC patients and had poorer consciousness and more organ failure than CPC patients when recognized. Many noncancer patients without access to specialist palliative care services were treated in the acute care setting with delayed recognition.
Division of Hospital Medicine, Department of Traumatology, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan.
Nin-Chieh
NC
Hsu
Yu-Feng
YF
Lin
Chin-Chung
CC
Shu
Ming-Chin
MC
Yang
Wen-Je
WJ
Ko
D000203:Activities of Daily Living; D017677:Age Distribution; D000368:Aged; D002908:Chronic Disease; D015897:Comorbidity; D005260:Female; D017051:Hospice Care / Q000592:standards* / Q000639:trends; D017052:Hospital Mortality; D006801:Humans; D007902:Length of Stay; D008297:Male; D020380:Needs Assessment; D009369:Neoplasms / Q000628:therapy; D010166:Palliative Care / Q000592:standards* / Q000706:statistics & numerical data / Q000639:trends; D016414:Resuscitation Orders; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D018709:Statistics, Nonparametric; D013624:Taiwan; D019452:Terminally Ill / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D062606:Tertiary Care Centers