An individualized, interactive intervention promotes terminally ill cancer patients' prognostic awareness and reduces cardiopulmonary resuscitation received in the last month of life : secondary analysis of a randomized clinical trial

Article

CHEN, Chen Hsiu | CHEN, Jen-Shi | WEN, Fur-Hsing | CHANG, Wen-Cheng | CHOU, Wen-Chi | HSIEH, Chia-Hsun | HOU, Ming-Mo | TANG, Siew Tzuh

CONTEXT/OBJECTIVE: Half of advanced cancer patients do not have accurate prognostic awareness (PA). However, few randomized clinical trials (RCTs) have focused on facilitating patients' PA to reduce their life-sustaining treatments (LSTs) at end of life (EOL). To address these issues, we conducted a double-blinded RCT on terminally ill cancer patients. METHODS: Experimental-arm participants received an individualized, interactive intervention tailored to their readiness for advanced care-planning and prognostic information. Control-arm participants received a symptom-management educational treatment. Intervention effectiveness in facilitating accurate PA and reducing LSTs received, two secondary RCT outcomes, was evaluated by intention-to-treat analysis using multivariate logistic regression. RESULTS: Participants (N=460) were randomly assigned 1:1 to experimental and control arms, each with 215 participants in the final sample. Referring to 151-180 days before death, experimental-arm participants had significantly higher odds of accurate PA than control-arm participants 61-90, 91-120, and 121-150 days before death (AOR [95% CI]: 2.04 [1.16-3.61], 1.94 [1.09-3.45], and 1.93 [1.16-3.21], respectively), but not 1-60 days before death. Experimental-arm participants with accurate PA were significantly less likely than control-arm participants without accurate PA to receive cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) (0.16 [0.03-0.73]), but not less likely to receive intensive care unit care and mechanical ventilation in their last month. CONCLUSIONS: Our intervention facilitated cancer patients' accurate PA early in their dying trajectory, reducing the risk of receiving CPR in the last month. Healthcare professionals should cultivate cancer patients' accurate PA early in the terminal-illness trajectory to allow them sufficient time to make informed EOL-care decisions to reduce CPR at EOL.

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2019.01.002

Voir la revue «JOURNAL OF PAIN AND SYMPTOM MANAGEMENT»

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