Applying Lessons From Ars Moriendi to Foster Dying Well in Acute Care Settings.

Medical and technological advances have made it possible to keep people alive well beyond what was once possible, leading health care providers to focus on life-sustaining measures rather than questioning the futility of such measures and considering quality of life. In the midst of the struggle to foster dying well in a medicalized environment, acute care nurses may be challenged with shifting the focus to providing optimal end-of-life care because of lack of training, time, and resources. A remedy for the current western societal approach to medicalized dying is to look back in history to a time during the late Middle Ages, when death was an accepted part of medieval life. A literary genre called Ars Moriendi (translated "the art of dying") was written and illustrated to provide instruction on how to die well and how to care for the dying. Nurses can apply lessons from this text to fulfill the ethical obligation to practice with dignity and provide compassionate end-of-life care. These lessons include helping patients and families identify goals of care and accept finitude, encouraging the participation of loved ones at the bedside, and fostering reconciliation at the end of life.

Facilitating care for childhood cancer survivors: integrating children's oncology group long-term follow-up guidelines and health links in clinical practice.

Childhood cancer survivors are a growing, vulnerable group with health care needs unique to their cancer treatments. They may experience many late physical and psychological complications (late effects) of treatment including organ dysfunction, infertility, second neoplasms, chronic hepatitis, musculoskeletal problems, alterations in cognitive function, and myriad psychosocial problems. Health care providers may be unaware of actual or potential survivor problems. Until recently, there were no clearly defined, easily accessible risk-based guidelines for cancer survivor follow-up care. This article will use a case-study approach to demonstrate how the newly developed Children's Oncology Group Long-term Follow-up Guidelines and Health Links can be used in clinical practice to improve awareness about late effects and the importance of follow-up care for childhood cancer survivors. The Children's Oncology Group Guidelines and Health Links were created by a multidisciplinary team of health care experts and patient advocates to provide a systematic plan for pediatric cancer survivor follow-up care and health education across the cancer continuum.

Pain management for the child with cancer in end-of-life care: APON position paper.

Although there have been major advances in the treatment of childhood cancer with an overall survival rate of more than 70%, cancer continues to be the leading cause of death in children resulting from disease. In 1998, 2,500 children in the United States died of cancer-related causes. Each year cancer kills more children than asthma, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, congenital anomalies, and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome combined. The Association of Pediatric Oncology Nurses (APON) is the leading professional organization for nurses caring for children and adolescents with cancer and their families. The highest standards of nursing practice are achieved through education, research, certification, advocacy, and affiliation. It is the position of APON that pain in the child dying of cancer can be effectively managed. This can be accomplished by making the prevention and alleviation of pain a primary goal, partnering with the patient and parents, and aggressively using appropriate pharmacologic and non-pharmacologic interventions. The pediatric oncology nurse has an essential role in the child's pain management at the end of life through nursing assessment, identifying expected outcomes, and performing and evaluating interventions.