ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Palliative care in low and middle-income countries is a new discipline, responding to a greater patient need, than in high-income countries. By its very nature, palliative as a specialty has to network with other specialties to provide quality care to patients. For any medical discipline to grow as a specialty, it should be well established in the teaching medical institutions of that country. Data show that palliative care is more likely to establish and grow in an academic health care institution. It is a necessity that multiple networking strategies are adopted to reach this goal. OBJECTIVES: (1) To describe a strategic approach to palliative care service development and integration into clinical academic setting. (2) To present the change in metrics to evaluate progress. DESIGN AND SETTING: This is a descriptive study wherein, the different strategies that are adopted by the Department of Palliative Medicine for networking in an academic health care institution and outside the institution are scrutinized. MEASUREMENT: The impact of this networking was assessed, one, at the level of academics and the other, at the level of service. The number of people who attended various training programs conducted by the department and the number of patients who availed palliative care service over the years were assessed. RESULTS: Ten different strategies were identified that helped with networking of palliative care in the institution. During this time, the referrals to the department increased both for malignant diseases (52-395) and nonmalignant diseases (5-353) from 2000 to 2013. The academic sessions conducted by the department for undergraduates also saw an increase in the number of hours from 6 to 12, apart from the increase in a number of courses conducted by the department for doctors and nurses. CONCLUSION: Networking is an essential strategy for the establishment of a relatively new medical discipline like palliative care in a developing and populous country like India, where the service is disproportionate to the demands.
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Hyponatremia is an undertreated finding in clinical practice. It is the most common electrolyte abnormality. Hyponatremia can be asymptomatic or can cause symptoms ranging from nausea and lethargy to convulsions and coma. Palliative care patients have a multitude of symptoms and there are several contributing factors towards this. Hyponatremia could be one of the contributing factors. Looking at the prevalence of hyponatremia would highlight the magnitude of the problem and would prompt healthcare professionals to investigate and treat hyponatremia in palliative care patients, which in turn might reduce symptoms such as fatigue and nausea. This could improve the quality of life in palliative care patients. AIM: To assess the prevalence of hyponatremia among patients referred for palliative care in a tertiary care hospital. METHODOLOGY: This is a descriptive study, with retrospective analysis of consecutive patient charts for 5 years. The sodium levels at the time of referral for palliative care, was reviewed. Inferential statistics for the result was calculated using the Z-test. RESULTS: Of the 2666 consecutive patient charts that were reviewed, sodium values were recorded in 796 charts. Among the recorded charts, 28.8 % of patients showed hyponatremia at the time of referral which was significant with a P value of 0.000 (<0.05). Of these, 61.1 % had malignancy as their diagnosis and the rest had nonmalignant diseases, ranging from trauma to chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. CONCLUSIONS: Prevalence of hyponatremia is significant in palliative care patients. A prospective study looking at the causes and clinical outcomes associated with hyponatremia in palliative care patients is needed.
