This episode features Jing-Da Pan (Department of Oncology, The Second Affiliated Hospital, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China School of Nursing, Guangzhou Medical University, Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China) What is already known about the topic? Family members are crucial in advance care planning for patients with life-limiting illnesses, particularly in Asia, where cultural values stress family-centeredness and paternalism. No study so far has attempted to ...
Jun 09, 2025•4 min
This episode features Victoria Ali (Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK. Bradford Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Bradford, UK) What is already known about the topic? Nurses deliver care for patients and those important to them across acts that may intentionally or potentially hasten death, navigating this care within the boundaries of healthcare systems and professional regulation. The increase in permissive legislation relating to assisted dying is challenging healthcare professionals...
Jun 09, 2025•5 min
This episode features Moyke Versluis (Research and Development, Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation (IKNL), Utrecht, The Netherlands Graduate school of Social and behavioral sciences, Tilburg University, Tilburg, The Netherlands). What is already known about the topic? Patients who are aware of their limited prognosis are more likely to be actively involved in advance care planning. Many patients with advanced cancer are unaware of their limited prognosis. What this paper adds? More pa...
Feb 27, 2025•4 min
This episode features Dr Madhurangi Perera (Cancer and Palliative Care Outcomes Centre, School of Nursing and Australia Centre for Healthcare Transformation, Faculty of Health, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, QLD, Australia) What is already known about the topic? Providing palliative and supportive care in the home setting for people with heart failure is advantageous because care can be provided in accordance with an individual’s way of life. Home-based palliative and supportive ...
Feb 27, 2025•4 min
This episode features Amy Brown (Marie Curie Research Centre, Division of Population Medicine, School of Medicine, Cardiff University, Cardiff, UK. Swansea University Medical School, Swansea University, Swansea, UK) What is already known about the topic? The third World Health Organization Global Patient Safety Challenge ‘Medication without harm’, emphasises the need for improved infrastructure through better reporting practices and cross-organisational learning from adverse events and near miss...
Feb 06, 2025•5 min
This episode features Dr Masanori Mori (Division of Palliative and Supportive Care, Seirei Mikatahara General Hospital, Hamamatsu, Japan) What is already known about the topic? As in Western countries’ health-care systems, advance care planning is being increasingly implemented in Asian ones, but consensus on its definition and recommendations based on Asian culture are lacking. In high-context, Confucian-influenced Asian societies, explicit conversations about end-of-life care with patients are...
Feb 04, 2025•5 min
This episode features Professor Raymond Voltz (Department of Palliative Medicine, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany; Center for Integrated Oncology Aachen Bonn Cologne Duesseldorf (CIO ABCD), Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany; Center for Health Services Research, Faculty of Medicine and University Hospital, University of Cologne, Cologne, Germany) What is already known about the topic? The wish ...
Nov 13, 2024•5 min
This episode features Jodie Crooks (Marie Curie, London, UK) and Dr Briony Hudson (Marie Curie, London, UK; Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Department, University College London, London, UK). What is already known about the topic? Research into palliative care for people experiencing homelessness is complex and requires input from people with lived experience. There is a dearth of evidence and/or guidance in how to support researchers to involve people with lived experience of homelessness ...
Nov 11, 2024•5 min
This episode features Suning Mao (State Key Laboratory of Oral Diseases & National Center for Stomatology & National Clinical Research Center for Oral Diseases, West China Hospital of Stomatology, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China) What is already known about the topic? Home-based palliative care has grown in popularity, but challenges in coordinating care and communication between hospital and home settings can impact transitions, healthcare consumption, care quality, and patient safet...
Oct 15, 2024•4 min
This episode features Professor Scott Murray (Primary Palliative Care Research Group, Usher Institute, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK). We are delighted with this special edition, and that Palliative Medicine has turned its focus on this important topic. Primary Palliative Care, delivering palliative care by trained primary care professionals can help meet the outstanding challenge of bringing accessible palliative care to everyone with a life-threatening illness. This special editio...
Oct 14, 2024•6 min
This episode features Professor Scott Murray (Primary Palliative Care Research Group, Usher Institute, The University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK). We are delighted with this special edition, and that Palliative Medicine has turned its focus on this important topic. Primary Palliative Care, delivering palliative care by trained primary care professionals can help meet the outstanding challenge of bringing accessible palliative care to everyone with a life-threatening illness. This special editio...
Oct 01, 2024•6 min
Primary Palliative Care - onwards and upwards!
Aug 20, 2024•4 min
This episode features Richard Keagan-Bull (Faculty of Health, Science, Social Care and Education, School of Nursing, Allied and Public Health, Kingston University London, London, UK). What is already known about the topic? Deaths of people with intellectual disabilities are often unanticipated, unplanned for and poorly managed. Service providers in residential settings are at the forefront of supporting people with intellectual disabilities at the end-of-life, but staff lack skills, knowledge, c...
Jun 12, 2024•4 min
This episode features Sheryn Tan (University of Adelaide, Adelaide, SA, Australia) and Dr Stephen Bacchi (Flinders University, Bedford Park, SA, Australia; Lyell McEwin Hospital, Elizabeth Vale, SA, Australia) What is already known about the topic? In palliative care patients for whom there is a need for non-oral antiseizure medications, and a preference to avoid intravenous access, options are primarily limited to benzodiazepines. In circumstances where the sedative effects of benzodiazepines a...
Jun 10, 2024•4 min
This episode features Dr Maria Arantzamendit, (Universidad de Navarra, Institute for Culture and Society-ATLANTES Global Observatory of Palliative Care, Pamplona, Navarra, Spain. IdISNA-Instituto de Investigación Sanitaria de Navarra. Medicina PaliativaK). What is already known about the topic? Palliative care professionals use coping strategies to deal with the emotional challenges of their work. Coping skills are essential for professionals to stay and remain in palliative care. What this pape...
Jun 10, 2024•5 min
This episode features Hannah Scott, (King’s College London, Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing Midwifery and Palliative Care, Cicely Saunders Institute, London, UK) What is already known about the topic? Person-centred outcome measures have been shown to improve the quality of care and patient outcomes in adult palliative care when successfully implemented into routine care. Several factors influence implementation in adult services, but they have not been identified in care for children wi...
Jun 10, 2024•5 min
This episode features Dr Fiona Kenney and Koby Anderson, (Ottawa Hospital Research Institute, Ottawa, ON, Canada Bruyère Research Institute, Ottawa, ON, Canada) What is already known about the topic? Previous research demonstrates a high prevalence of severe grief symptoms up to a year post-death of a loved one among those who experienced bereavement during the COVID-19 pandemic. No previous study has assessed changes in the severity of grief more than a year after the death of a loved one durin...
Mar 13, 2024•4 min
This episode features Sue-Ling Chang, (CHU de Québec-Université Laval Research Center, Oncology Division, Québec City, QC, Canada) What is already known about the topic? There is a growing interest in psilocybin-assisted therapy worldwide, particularly to treat existential distress at the end of life. What this paper adds? In this study, we show that the social acceptability of psilocybin-assisted therapy to treat existential distress at the end of life is high in Canada and identify factors ass...
Mar 13, 2024•5 min
This episode features Dr Carlos Seiça Cardoso (Faculty of Medicine, University of Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal CINTESIS@RISE, MEDCIDS, Faculty of Medicine of the University of Porto, Porto, Portugal) What is already known about the topic? The burden of chronic, progressive, incurable and life-threatening illness is increasing, highlighting the need to integrate palliative care into patients’ care plans. Data indicate that involving General Practitioners in the provision of palliative care may impr...
Feb 21, 2024•4 min
This episode features Ellis Slotman (Netherlands Comprehensive Cancer Organisation (IKNL), Utrecht, the Netherlands) What is already known about the topic? Potentially inappropriate end-of-life care in patients with cancer is still common. The COVID-19 pandemic has been shown to affect cancer diagnosis and treatment, but evidence on how the pandemic has affected end-of-life care is limited. What this paper adds? The COVID-19 pandemic was associated with less potentially inappropriate care at the...
Jan 12, 2024•5 min
This episode features Dr Vanessa Abrahamson, (Centre for Health Services Studies, University of Kent, Kent, UK). What is already known about the topic? Increasingly, people at end-of-life want to die at home but this relies heavily on family carers to support the patient. Many carers struggle with the practical and emotional burden of caring for a loved one at home. Services providing hospice care at home are highly rated by carers but access is limited and the model of care varies greatly betwe...
Oct 30, 2023•4 min
This episode features Dr Nivedita Ashok, (University College London, London, UK). What is already known about the topic? Individuals with intellectual disability or serious mental illness have high rates of mortality due to physical comorbidities. These populations have specific needs that should be met to provide optimum palliative care and maintain optimum mental healthcare at the end-of-life. While research exists describing the problems these populations face, little is known about how to im...
Oct 09, 2023•5 min
This episode features Caitlin Spooner (Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Department, University College London, London, UK). What is already known about the topic? - Currently, there is no gold standard for evaluating how different methods of prognosticating in advanced cancer impact on patient care. - Prognostic models are principally evaluated by their statistical performance, determining their discrimination and calibration. However, before any prognostic model can be recommended for use i...
Sep 11, 2023•5 min
This episode features Dr Amara Nwosu (Lancaster Medical School, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK; Liverpool University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, Liverpool, UK; and Marie Curie Hospice Liverpool, Liverpool, UK). The podcast is an overview of a published editorial on telehealth in palliative care. Dr Nwosu highlights the unrealised potential of palliative care telehealth, and discusses the opportunities and challenges associated with telehealth. Finally, Dr Nwosu describes the next steps ...
Sep 07, 2023•6 min
Title "Hospital-service use in the last year of life by patients aged ⩾60 years who died of heart failure or cardiomyopathy: A retrospective linked data study" Description This episode features Dr Gursharan K Singh (Centre for Healthcare Transformation, Faculty of Health, Queensland University of Technology (QUT), Brisbane, QLD, Australia). What is already known about the topic? - Evidence based guidelines recommend palliative care for individuals with advanced heart failure, yet there is limite...
Aug 10, 2023•4 min
This episode features Hannah May Scott (Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing Midwifery and Palliative Care, Cicely Saunders Institute, King’s College London, London, UK). What is already known about the topic? - Although spiritual concerns are recognised as a core component of palliative care for children, there is a paucity of primary data. - Self-report data from children is rare, and existing evidence is largely proxy data from parents or health and social care professionals and mainly foc...
Jun 07, 2023•4 min
This episode features Dr Jenny Lau (Department of Supportive Care, Princess Margaret Cancer Centre, University Health Network, Toronto, ON, Canada; Department of Family and Community Medicine, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada; Division of Palliative Care, University Health Network, Toronto, ON, Canada) and Dr. Daniel Buchman (Everyday Ethics Lab, Centre for Addiction and Mental Health, Toronto, ON, Canada; Dalla Lana School of Public Health, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada; ...
Mar 27, 2023•4 min
This episode features Dr Rachael Moss (Bradford Institute for Health Research, Bradford Teaching Hospitals Foundation Trust, Bradford, UK). What is already known about the topic: - The degree to which individuals access and use palliative and end-of-life care services varies across communities and countries. What this paper adds: - This study found that the South Asian community (in Bradford, UK) are currently not ready to engage with palliative and end-of-life care services despite local initia...
Feb 09, 2023•4 min
This episode features Isabel Vandenbogaerde (End-of-life Care Research Group, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB) & Ghent University, Ghent, Belgium). What is already known about the topic: Involvement of family carers in advance care planning conversations is crucial for end-of-life decision-making. Family carers are willing to engage in advance care planning conversations, but experience barriers in doing so. Healthcare professionals may play an important role in supporting family carers in t...
Jan 10, 2023•4 min
This episode features Dr Joyce Chung and Weilin Chen (School of Nursing, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hung Hom, Kowloon, Hong Kong SAR, China). What is already known about the topic: End-of-life communication can improve patients’ quality of life, ease the bereavement experience, raise care satisfaction and reduce the utilisation of aggressive and expensive medical care. Healthcare professionals’ perceived barriers, such as fear of causing distress, impede the delivery of end-of-life co...
Jan 10, 2023•4 min
