Profile of patients treated by the palliative care team in the gastroenterology ward of a tertiary hospital
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.47456/rbps.v26i1.51131Keywords:
Palliative Care, Gastroenterology, Functional Status, Patient Care TeamAbstract
Introduction: Palliative care is a competence of gastroenterology, considering mainly chronic diseases and neoplasms treated by the specialty. Care is often provided by the attending physician, but specialized professionals have a broader view of the needs and conduct with patients and caregivers. Objectives: To analyze requests for interconsultations with the palliative care team for patients with gastroenterological diseases in a tertiary hospital, for 01 year. Methods: Longitudinal, retrospective study, evaluating data from patients with interconsultations for palliative care, comparing with those without interconsultation. Results: only 10.1% of the 336 patients received interconsultations, answered within 24 hours. Patients with consultation-based intervention were older than the others (63.5 x 54.7 years – p<0.001), had a longer hospital stay (22 x 13 days – p<0.001), and there was no difference in gender. 42% died (15/34 x 15/302 – p<0.001). Only 16 of the 154 cirrhotic patients (10.4%) and 1 of the 32 patients with inflammatory bowel disease received consultation-based intervention, while 39.1% and 41.1% with neoplasia and cirrhosis associated with hepatocellular carcinoma were evaluated. Severely impaired clinical functionality was observed on 12/27 (44.5%). Discussion: Even though it is a hospital unit that has a palliative care team, the gastroenterology service requested few opinions for chronic and disabling diseases, a result not observed in the request for consultation-based intervention for oncological diseases. Conclusion: Increasing interdisciplinarity between gastroenterology and the team specialized in palliative care may provide shared objectives in improving quality of life, preventing and alleviating suffering, with an approach centered on the person with serious health-related suffering.
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