Communication between healthcare professionals and relatives of patients approaching the end-of-life: A systematic review of qualitative evidence

This episode features Rebecca Anderson (Marie Curie Palliative Care Research Department,  University College London, London, UK).  Poor communication from healthcare professionals is a common complaint from relatives of patients at the end-of-life. Communication with relatives at this time is important for high quality end-of-life care and for relatives’ long-term well-being. Common communication strategies are identified including highlighting the patient’s deterioration to aid decision-making, references to patient wishes, providing relatives with options, tailoring information to individuals and using pacing and staging of information. Healthcare professionals state a belief in using honest, direct language and involving families in decision-making, but there is variation in the extent to which this is implemented in practice. Nurses and allied healthcare professionals play an important role in providing individualized communication with relatives. There is a need for more research on communication with relatives in palliative care settings and with different members of the multidisciplinary team. Training is needed to help healthcare professionals to translate communication guidelines into practice while considering their own emotional needs. Interventions such as question prompt list could also be used to help relatives get the information they need.
 

Full paper available from: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0269216319852007

 
If you would like to record a podcast about your published (or accepted) Palliative Medicine paper, please contact Dr Amara Nwosu: anwosu@liverpool.ac.uk