Japanese Attitude Toward Terminal Illness and End-of-Life Care:Analysis of Questionnaire Responses-Part I / 日本農村医学会雑誌

ABSTRACT

　　This paper deals with an analysis of responses to a questionnaire survey to look at the attitude of Japanese toward the problems involving telling the terminally ill patients the truth, palliative care and other related matters. The survey, designed to understand and treat the terminally ill patients properly, was carried out with the cooperation of 76 out of 114 hospitals affiliated with the National Federation of Agricultural Cooperatives for Health and Welfare.　　Effective responses came from 7,811 people (females/ males＝1.9 and age from 14 to 91). They consisted of high school students, nursing school students, hospital staffs and people with other occupations. Most of them were ready to join this study.　　Of the respondents, it was found, 21.0% of the respondents were religious people, 14.5% had seriously considered their own death, 2.4% wanted to live as long as possible even with a life-limiting disease, 26.0% wanted to be informed of the terminal illness generally, 76.4% wanted to be precisely informed, 34.5% wanted family members being informed on a terminal diagnosis, 27.5% wanted to be informed alone without the knowledge of the family members, 90.1% wanted to be informed by doctors in charge, but not by family doctors, 60.3% wanted the use of a proper dose of opium to alleviate pain, 67.3% wanted to use hospice care, 7.8% wanted to see a man of religion at the terminal stage of life, and 39.6% wanted to die at their own home.　　Significant differences were found in the response to the questions depending on their sex, age and occupations (high school students, nursing school students, medical persons or people with other occupations).　　The findings of 22 other large-scale surveys conducted between 1987 and 2012 showed that the ratio of those who did not like to receive the information on terminal (IT) decreased (from 30-40% to blow 1%), and that the ratio of those who wanted to be informed of their incurable illness increased (from 55-65% to 75-85%), thus indicating that IT seems to have being accepted widely in Japan.