Palliative care for pediatric intensive care patients and families. Curr Opin Pediatr 2020 Jun;32(3):428-435
Date
05/07/2020Pubmed ID
32374580DOI
10.1097/MOP.0000000000000903Scopus ID
2-s2.0-85084390680 (requires institutional sign-in at Scopus site) 25 CitationsAbstract
PURPOSE OF REVIEW: Children with medical or surgical critical illness or injury require skillful attention to physical, emotional, psychological, and spiritual needs, whereas their families need support and guidance in facing life-threatening or life-changing events and gut-wrenching decisions. This article reviews current evidence and best practices for integrating palliative care into the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU), with a focus on surgical patients.
RECENT FINDINGS: Palliative care is best integrated in a tiered approach, with primary palliative care provided by the PICU and surgical providers for all patients and families, including basic symptom management, high-quality communication, and end-of-life care. Secondary and tertiary levels of care involve unit or team-based 'champions' with additional expertise, and subspecialty palliative care teams, respectively. PICU and surgical providers should be able to provide primary palliative care, to identify patients and families for whom a palliative care consult would be helpful, and should be comfortable introducing the concept of palliative care to families.
SUMMARY: This review provides a framework and tools to enable PICU and surgical providers to integrate palliative care best practices into patient and family care.
Author List
Rothschild CB, Derrington SFAuthor
Charles Baron Rothschild MD Associate Professor in the Pediatrics department at Medical College of WisconsinMESH terms used to index this publication - Major topics in bold
AdultChild
Communication
Critical Care
Family
Female
Humans
Intensive Care Units, Pediatric
Male
Palliative Care
Practice Guidelines as Topic
Terminal Care
