BACKGROUND: There has been a call for palliative care (PC) published research to support the impact and need for more specialty PC services.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to characterize research in PC over a 15-year period in 3 PC journals published in the United States.
DESIGN: The authors reviewed every issue of the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, Journal of Palliative Medicine, and American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine from 2004 through 2018. Studies included were original articles and brief reports. Study type (qualitative, quantitative), author (first and last), gender, and professional degree of the author (first and last) were recorded.
RESULTS: A total of 4881 articles were included in this study. The proportion of quantitative papers significantly increased across 3 time points from 63% to 67% to 78%. The proportion of women first authors increased across all 3 time points (54%, 2004-2008; 57%, 2009-2013; 60%, 2014-2018), and the proportion of women last authors increased across all time points (38%, 2004-2008; 44%, 2009-2013; 46%, 2014-2018). More than 40% of authors were physicians.
CONCLUSIONS: Published PC studies are increasingly quantitative in design. Gender authorship is female dominant for the first authors and increasingly equal across genders for the last authors.
This study explored the death narrative in the late Qing dynasty as expressed in Chinese newspapers in the 19th century. Using textual analysis, this study identified three themes regarding death and dying during this period: euphemism of death, definition of “good death,” and Western influence on the death narrative. The study results of death narrative in the 19th century indicate the historical root of perception of death among the current Chinese people, which could help the development of a culturally sensitive hospice services for Chinese people in China and other countries by suggesting language use, patients approaching, and mental health intervention for the service providers and policy makers.
Background: Research is important internationally, impacting on health service provision and patient benefit. Journals play an important dissemination role, but there may be geographical bias, potentially affecting access to evidence.
Aim: To understand if there is a relationship between the continent of journals and that of contributing authors.
Design: Bibliometric analysis of journal citation report data (June 2018). Odds ratio of association of an author being from region, region of journal publication, publication model and the number of papers.
Setting: Journals specialising in palliative care research, with an impact factor above the median impact factor for their most common indexing category.
Results: Five journals: three published in Europe (Palliative Medicine, BMJ Supportive and Palliative Care, and BMC Palliative Care) and two in North America (Journal of Pain and Symptom Management and Journal of Palliative Medicine). Authors were from 30+ countries, but mostly North America (54.18%) or Europe (27.94%). Preliminary sensitivity tests show that the odds of an author being from a North American institution increase 16.4 times (p < 0.01; 95% confidence interval: 12.9, 20.8) if the region of journal publication is North America. The odds of an author being from a European institution is 14.0 times (p < 0.01; 95% confidence interval: 10.9, 17.9) higher if the region of journal publication is Europe.
Conclusion: Publishers, editors and authors are concentrated in North America or Europe. North American authors are more present in North American journals and European authors in European journals. This polarised approach, if replicated across readerships, may lead to research waste, duplication, and be sub-optimal for healthcare development.
As this issue celebrates 60 years since the founding of Cruse, it is timely to review Bereavement Care, an important element in the development of the organisation, in the context of other journals with similar aims. The background to the publication of Bereavement Care will be presented together with journals that contain a similar subject coverage. The way the journals are organised will be briefly explored as well as some of their most cited and the most-read papers. Commentary on the latest issue of these journals will be provided along with reflection on other sources of bereavement literature. Some suggestions for future topics are also included.
This work presents a historical analysis of death announcements (N = 1,443) posted in the New York Times between 1912 and 2002. Announcements were coded according to two main categories: the genre of the announcement and the presence of emotion words. Four distinct main genres emerged: death notices, memorials, recognition postings by organizations, and recognition postings by nonorganizational parties (friends and family). The proportion of death notices declined steadily from 1912 to 2002, while the proportion of announcements paying tribute to the deceased increased. The announcements were also analyzed in terms of emotion words used, and it is argued that the increasing frequency of emotion words used in the death announcements reflects a progressive emotionalization and psychologization of grief and loss.
OBJECTIVE: To examine how Canadian newspapers portrayed physicians' role and medical assistance in dying (MAiD).
DESIGN: Qualitative textual analysis.
SETTING: Online and print articles from Canadian French and English newspapers.
PARTICIPANTS: 813 newspaper articles published from 1972 to 2016.
RESULTS: Key Canadian events defined five eras. From 1972 to 1990, newspapers portrayed physician's MAiD role as a social issue by reporting supportive public opinion polls and revealing it was already occurring in secret. From 1991 to 1995, newspapers discussed legal aspects of physicians' MAiD role including Rodriguez' Supreme Court of Canada appeal and Federal government Bills. From 1996 to 2004, journalists discussed professional aspects of physicians' MAiD role and the growing split between palliative care and physicians who supported MAiD. They also reported on court cases against Canadian physicians, Dr Kevorkian and suffering patients who could not receive MAiD. From 2005 to 2013, newspapers described political aspects including the tabling of MAiD legislation to change physicians' role. Lastly, from 2014 to 2016, newspapers again portrayed legal aspects of physicians' role as the Supreme Court of Canada was anticipated to legalise MAiD and the Québec government passed its own legislation. Remarkably, newspapers kept attention to MAiD over 44 years before it became legal. Articles generally reflected Canadians' acceptance of MAiD and physicians were typically portrayed as opposing it, but not all did.
CONCLUSIONS: Newspaper portrayals of physicians' MAiD role discussed public opinion, politicians' activities and professional and legal aspects. Portrayals followed the issue-attention cycle through three of five stages: 1) preproblem, 2) alarmed discovery and euphoric enthusiasm and 3) realising the cost of significant progress.
L'association réunit un groupe de lecture de la revue, conçu comme un moyen de formation continue pour nos bénévoles accompagnants. Il s'agit bien, dans l'expérience que nous en avons, d'un moment d'information mais sourtout d'échanges de nos pratiques d'accompagnement. C'est aussi un moyen de soutenir la motivation des bénévoles et leur sentiment d'appartenance à un courant fort qui met l'humain au coeur de leur engagement.
Context: Implementation of pediatric palliative care as a primary practice relevant for all pediatricians and pediatric subspecialists requires a grounding, shared knowledge. This study reports on the innovative application of a monthly Palliative Care E-Journal Club (Pal Care Club) to foster shared palliative care knowledge hospital wide.
Objectives: To explore the impact of a monthly electronic journal club to increase the number of palliative care-relevant articles read and discussed and to enhance provider comfort with the integration and introduction of palliative care.
Methods: A single cohort, predesign–post-design was utilized to explore the impact of a monthly palliative care electronic journal club.
Results: Preintervention barriers to reading pediatric palliative care literature were primarily access and time. The mean of paired differences (post–pre) for the number of full-text articles read per month was 2.56 (SD = 1.25). The journal club intervention increased participant personal comfort with integrating palliative care principles at the bedside (p < 0.0001) and introducing pediatric palliative care to patients and families (p < 0.0001).
Conclusion: An electronic journal club is a feasible and acceptable means of increasing number of palliative care articles read and discussed across an institution as well as enhancing pediatric palliative care knowledge across subspecialist and general pediatric services.
PC-FACS (FastArticleCriticalSummaries for Clinicians inPalliativeCare) provides hospice and palliative care clinicians with concise summaries of the most important findings from more than 100 medical and scientific journals. If you have colleagues who would benefit from receiving PCFACS, please encourage them to join the AAHPM at aahpm.org. Comments from readers are welcomed at pc-facs@aahpm.org.
During the 19th century, suicide rates increased in many countries. The press may have contributed to this increase, even though empirical evidence is lacking in this regard. We assessed suicide statistics within five territories of the Austro-Hungarian Empire between 1871 and 1910 and combined these data with a content analysis of suicide reporting in five newspapers, each appearing in one of the five territories. The analysis revealed a covariation between the quantity of reporting and the number of suicides within all five regions. Furthermore, the quantity of reporting significantly predicted the following year's suicides. Although the causal order of suicides and the quantity of reporting should be assessed with caution, evidence is consistent with the idea that the press may have contributed to the establishment of suicide as a mass phenomenon. The findings also support contemporary guidelines for journalists, especially the notion of avoiding undue repetition of suicide stories.
BACKGROUND: The availability of smartphone applications has increased rapidly including applications related to palliative care. The scope of these available apps has not been synthesized.
OBJECTIVE: The purpose of this study was to identify and review available palliative care-related smartphone applications for clinicians.
DESIGN: Smartphone application platform stores, for example, App Store iOS, Google Play Store, Windows App-Microsoft Store, and Blackberry World App store were searched (December 2016) using relevant key words.
RESULTS: Forty-six palliative care applications targeting clinicians were identified, including clinical guidelines (n = 17), advance care planning (n = 9), training materials in palliative care (n = 7), and pharmaceutical tools (n = 7), and platforms for distributing current palliative care news, articles, and opinions (n = 6). The majority of the applications were free and available in English. The most common platforms were Android and iOS.
CONCLUSIONS: The number of palliative care apps targeting clinicians has increased dramatically for the past five years. However, many apps did not report adequate information to judge the evidence upon which the apps were based.
The strongest argument against assisted dying, among more than 90 responses from readers to our recent cluster of articles (bmj.com/content/assisted-dying), was that under no circumstances should doctors intentionally kill patients. Eunice Minford, consultant surgeon in Northern Ireland, quoted Elizabeth Butler-Sloss: “The law . . . rests on the principle that we do not involve ourselves in deliberately bringing about the deaths of others. Once we start making exceptions based on arbitrary criteria such as terminal illness, the frontier becomes just a line in the sand, easily crossed and hard to defend.”
Assisted suicide might also be open to abuse, some readers thought. Barry Cullen, retired GP from Fareham, Hampshire, asked, “Would there be the same level of support for physician assisted suicide if it were introduced as a cheaper alternative to palliative care in an NHS already starved of resources?”
L’apparition de nouvelles technologies, tout d’abord par les réseaux sociaux sur Internet (texte, image, vidéo, émoticône), puis via les applications pour les téléphones intelligents (Smartphones) a profondément modifié les façons de communiquer, notamment des jeunes générations. Ces nouvelles technologies de la communication ont-elles aussi transformé les rapports à la mort et au deuil ? De nouvelles pratiques sont-elles apparues depuis la démocratisation d’Internet et des téléphones intelligents ? Dans cet article, on s’interroge sur deux types d’expression du deuil, dans un premier temps, sur la façon dont les individus expriment leur deuil dans les réseaux sociaux numériques et d’autre part sur la façon dont la presse et les journalistes créent des mémoriaux pour les victimes lors d’événements traumatiques (attentats, catastrophes).
INTRODUCTION: The goal of palliative care (PC) is to improve the quality of life of terminal stage patients and their families. The subject frequently appears in the mass-media and this helps create a socially accepted identity. The aim of this study is to describe and analyse PC related news items appeared in the Spanish written media.
METHODOLOGY: A descriptive cross-sectional study was designed. Considering diffusion, scope and the range in editorial policy criteria, four printed newspapers (PN) were selected, together with four exclusively digital media sources (DM). Through Mynews, a newspaper content depository, and the search tool for each DM website, articles published between 2009 and 2014 which included the terms "palliative care" and "palliative medicine" were sought. A questionnaire was created to characterise each article identified and a descriptive analysis was undertaken.
RESULTS: A total of 627 articles were identified, of which 359 (57%) were published in PN (42% in the printed editions -PE- 16% in their online editions -OE-) and 268 (43%) in DM. In general, they appeared mainly in sections concerning Health (23%), Culture and Society (18%) and General/Home News (15%). In PE, just 2% were found in the Health section and nearly 70% in Culture and Society and General/Home News. Most of the articles were informative in nature and contained socio-political messages (90%). Statements by PC professionals were found in 35% of the articles and by politicians in 32%. The most frequent content was related to facing end of life (74%) and patient quality of life (70%).
CONCLUSIONS: The Spanish written media reflects the socio-political interest aroused by PC. Nevertheless, messages circulating about PC do not describe professional practice, or the contribution of the same for patients. Content more in line with the clinical practice might help contribute to the development of this new area of medicine.
BACKGROUND: Palliative care (PC) research in Africa has been proposed as a fifth dimension of the World Health Organization PC Public Health Strategy. We conducted a scoping review of published articles (2005-2016) on palliative care development (PCD) in African countries. Forty-seven articles were found across 26 countries.
OBJECTIVE: To study whether the number of published articles on PCD in countries in Africa can be used as an indicator of PCD.
DESIGN: This is a secondary analysis of a completed scoping review.MEASUREMENTS: Spearman correlations were applied to the number of published articles ("published articles") and the number of published articles with a coauthor from a high-income country (HIC) ("HIC published articles") with level of PCD using Lynch et al's updated world map (PC World Map) as a proxy. A subanalysis was undertaken for Anglophone versus non-Anglophone countries.
RESULTS: There were positive Spearman correlations (r) between the PC World Map's levels and published articles (r = 0.73; p < 0.001), and with HIC published articles (r = 0.68; p < 0.001). For Anglophone countries, the r was statistically significant (p < 0.001) at 0.69 and 0.70, versus 0.58 and 0.45 for non-Anglophone countries for published articles and HIC published articles, respectively. Kruskal-Wallis test showed a statistically significant difference between Anglophone and non-Anglophone countries for both published articles and HIC published articles (p < 0.01).
CONCLUSION: Published articles and HIC published articles on PCD in Africa had strong positive r's with the PC World Map. These measures may be considered as two indicators of PCD for countries in Africa, particularly for Anglophone countries.
L'auteur s'interroge sur la manière dont est traité la mort des personnes précaires. Pourquoi certaines morts, et surtout l'oubli qui suit, sont considérés comme révoltants ? Et pourquoi d'autres sont considérés comme socialement acceptables ? Pour répondre à ces questions l'auteur s'appuie sur le travail de recherche mené avec les équipes éducatives du centre d'hébergement et de réinsertion sociale (CHRS) et du Centre d'hébergement d'accueil d'urgence (CHAU) de l'Armée du Salut à Reims.
Cette thèse, qui conjugue des approches historiques et communicationnelles, se propose d'interroger les représentations de la vieillesse dans la société française contemporaine. Qu'on analyse les discours politiques, les messages publicitaires, les personnages cinématographiques ou littéraires, on perçoit une réelle cohérence dans les stéréotypes caractérisant la vieillesse. Cette recherche doctorale s'attache à démontrer en quoi ces représentations résultent d'une évolution historique, d'une idéologie - le "jeunisme" - autant qu'elles sont l'expression de "l'air du temps". (extrait R.A.).
Origine : BDSP. Notice produite par FNG 87R0xqoF. Diffusion soumise à autorisation
L'objectif de ce mémoire est de savoir de quelle manière les journalistes en tant qu'acteurs de la sphère médiatique et producteurs de textes et de discours de presse écrite se réappoprient «l'être culturel» soin palliatif et accompagnement, avant et après la loi Leonetti. Afin de répondre à ce questionnement, l'auteure a mis en place une méthodologie de recherche basée sur l'étude statistique de corpus parus au sein des 4 titres «Le Monde», «Le Figaro», «Libération», «La Croix», un rubriquage de ces articles et l'analyse qualitative d'un corpus d'entretiens semi-directifs menés avec 3 journalistes ayant travaillé au sein de ces titres.
Le dossier "Annoncer la mort" se compose de six articles consacrés aux représentations de la mort dans les médias d'information. Sont étudiés successivement les nécrologies de presse, les faire-part de décès dans les journaux, le site Internet "jesuismort.com" oscillant entre nécrologie et biographie, le deuil sur le réseau social Facebook et les funérailles télévisées. L'approche est à la fois philosophique, psychanalytique, historique et anthropologique.
L'accompagnement des personnes en fin de vie est rarement abordé dans les médias. Pourtant la loi Kouchner (9 juin 1999) a ouvert le chemin des soins palliatifs. D'où vient en France ce peu d'intérêt des médias pour l'accompagnement et les soins palliatifs ?
[Résumé éditeur]