Abstract
BackgroundThe prompt availability of medications to manage symptoms is key to high quality end-of-life care and anticipatory prescribing of these drugs is thought good practice. This study explored the challenges...
Highlights
The prompt availability of medications to manage symptoms is key to high quality end-of-life care and anticipatory prescribing of these drugs is thought good practice
The distress caused by these symptoms may be a factor in preventing people staying at home,[3 4] and the management of these symptoms is a major consideration in quality of care at the end of life[5] and is a component of the new quality standards for end-of-life care for adults in England.[6]
Participants were asked about these characteristics via a checklist at the time of consent, but in order to maintain anonymity their responses were not linked in any way to the content of individual interviews
Summary
The prompt availability of medications to manage symptoms is key to high quality end-of-life care and anticipatory prescribing of these drugs is thought good practice. This study explored the challenges encountered by primary and community health professionals in Leicestershire and Rutland related to anticipatory prescribing when caring for terminally ill patients who wish to remain at home to die. The Liverpool Care Pathway for care of the dying (LCP) is an explicit framework for the care of people in the last days of their lives and is well established across much of the UK.[8] The pathway, which is constructed as a series of goals of care, incorporates management of the common end-of-life symptoms.[9 10] To achieve best care at the end of life requires anticipatory clinical planning for a range of potential situations and patient needs.[11] In the community setting, the planning of symptom management must include consideration of how appropriate medications can be accessed and administered as promptly as possible once the patient develops a problem.
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