These findings support that previous work noting many patients experience dyspnea at end of life. Despite national guidelines, health care providers may still be underrecognizing and likely not optimally treating dyspnea at the end of life in the hospital. Collaboration with palliative medicine providers may improve assessments and treatments for quality end-of-life care for hospitalized patients.
Older adults compose a large portion of patients with persistent pain. Opioid analgesics are widely used to treat acute and persistent pain in cancer and end-of-life care, but their use in other types of persistent pain in older adults is controversial. Clinicians and regulators must work together, balancing the legitimate medical need for opioids while acknowledging increasing opioid misuse and morbidity and mortality related to opioids.
The CARES program of palliative consultation addresses the needs of nursing home residents. The model has potential to be reproducible in in other communities.
Persistent pain is a challenging problem in the elderly and is not a normal process in aging. Successful management of persistent pain can be achieved through comprehensive assessment, use of routine pain medication and careful monitoring of medical functional status.
Persistent pain is a challenging problem in the elderly and is not a normal process in aging. Successful management of persistent pain can be achieved through comprehensive assessment, use of routine pain medication and careful monitoring of medical functional status.
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