A Survey on Palliative Care Practices of Healthcare Professionals in an Acute Care Hospital

Objective: This study intended to clarify whether healthcare professionals provide palliative care and the factors associated with such care. Methods: An anonymous self-administered questionnaire survey was conducted of healthcare professionals in in an acute care hospital in order to investigate their practice and understanding of palliative care as well as their personal attributes. A multivariate logistic regression analysis was conducted to identify factors associated with their palliative care practice. Results: 605 of 955 respondents (response rate: 63%) answered. Twenty-three percent of all respondents answered that they were involved in palliative care practice. A multivariate logistic regression analysis revealed understanding the concept and practical components of palliative care, including the functions of palliative care, differences between primary and specialized palliative care, and advance care planning, were factors associated with palliative care practice. Conclusion: Palliative care specialists should provide the educational support for healthcare professionals to enable them to deepen their understanding of palliative care. Such support from the palliative care specialist may promote the health care professionals’ awareness of their own roles in palliative care.

The approach for development of palliative care team database

In 2011, we reported the usefulness of a database（DB）that was established by the members of a palliative care team（PCT）. Since then, we updated DB depending on the requests of PCT. We revised DB mentioned below. We developed a form for keeping a record of PCT members’care for patients, their family members or others, and a record of recommendation for each problem list. We also updated another form so that the evaluation of Support Team Assessment Schedule of Japan（STAS-J）had been showed sequentially, added an entry form of Palliative Prognostic Index, and extracted data required by Japan Society for Palliative Medicine in order to evaluate the activity of PCT. The database could be used by many hospitals, because it was created by the commercially available software.