Simultaneous Care in Oncology: A 7-Year Experience at ESMO Designated Centre at Veneto Institute of Oncology, Italy.

Publisher: MDPI Country of Publication: Switzerland NLM ID: 101526829 Publication Model: Electronic Cited Medium: Print ISSN: 2072-6694 (Print) Linking ISSN: 20726694 NLM ISO Abbreviation: Cancers (Basel) Subsets: PubMed not MEDLINE

Original Publication: Basel, Switzerland : MDPI

Benefits of early palliative care referral in oncology are well-validated. At the Veneto Institute of Oncology-IRCCS, a simultaneous-care outpatient clinic (SCOC) has been active since 2014, where patients with advanced cancer are evaluated by an oncologist together with a palliative care team. We prospectively assessed SCOC patients’ characteristics and SCOC outcomes through internal procedure indicators. Data were retrieved from the SCOC prospectively maintained database. There were 753 eligible patients. The median age was 68 years; primary tumor sites were gastrointestinal (75.2%), genitourinary (15.0%) and other sites (9.8%). Predominant symptoms were psychological issues (69.4%), appetite loss (67.5%) and pain (65.9%). Dyspnea was reported in 53 patients (7%) in the referral form, while it was detected in 226 patients (34.2%) during SCOC visits (p < 0.0001). Median survival of patients after the SCOC visit was 7.3 months. Survival estimates by the referring oncologist were significantly different from the actual survival. Psychological intervention was deemed necessary and undertaken in 34.6% of patients, and nutritional support was undertaken in 37.9% of patients. Activation of palliative care services was prompted for 77.7% of patients. Out of 357 patients whose place of death is known, 69.2% died at home, in hospice or residential care. With regard to indicators’ assessment, the threshold was reached for 9 out of 11 parameters (81.8%) requested by the procedure. This study confirmed the importance of close collaboration between oncologists and palliative care teams in responding properly to cancer patients’ needs. The introduction of a procedure with indicators allowed punctual assessment of a team’s performance.

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Keywords: advanced disease; early palliative care; indicators of integration; simultaneous care; symptom control

Date Created: 20220528 Latest Revision: 20230308

20250114

PMC9139444

10.3390/cancers14102568

35626172