14 Facts About End-of-life care

End-of-life care refers to health care provided in the time leading up to a person's death.

End-of-life care can be provided in the hours, days, or months before a person dies and encompasses care and support for a person's mental and emotional needs, physical comfort, spiritual needs, and practical tasks.

Decisions about end-of-life care are often informed by medical, financial and ethical considerations.

Advanced End-of-life care planning is the process by which a person of any age is able to provide their preferences and ensure that their future medical treatment aligns with their personal values and life goals.

An advance healthEnd-of-life care directive is a legal document that either documents a persons decisions about desired treatment or indicates who a person has entrusted to make their End-of-life care decisions for them.

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Advanced End-of-life care planning often includes preferences for CPR initiation, nutrition, as well as decisions about the use of machines to keep a person breathing, or support their heart or kidneys.

Many studies have reported benefits to patient's who complete advanced End-of-life care planning, specifically noting the improved patient and surrogate satisfaction with communication and decreased clinician distress.

However, there is a notable lack of empirical data about what outcome improvements patients experience, as there are considerable discrepancies in what constitutes as advanced End-of-life care planning and heterogeneity in the outcomes measured.

End-of-life care conversations are part of the treatment planning process for terminally ill patients requiring palliative care involving a discussion of a patient's prognosis, specification of goals of care, and individualized treatment planning.

Originally developed to provide evidence based End-of-life care to dying cancer patients, this pathway has been adapted and used for a variety of chronic conditions at clinics in the UK and internationally.

Studies have shown that barriers to providing adequate spiritual and religious End-of-life care include a lack of cultural understanding, limited time, and a lack of formal training or experience.

End-of-life care is an interdisciplinary endeavor involving physicians, nurses, physical therapists, occupational therapists, pharmacists and social workers.

Medical doctors who have more experience and training in end-of-life care are more likely to cite comfort in having end-of-life-care discussions with patients.

Those physicians who have more exposure to end-of-life care have a higher likelihood of involving nurses in their decision-making process.