Context Hospice care focuses on improving the quality of end-of-life care and respecting patients’ preferences regarding end-of-life treatment. The impact of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) on the utilization of hospice services is unknown. Objectives To investigate the utilization of hospice care services before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Methods All patients ( n = 19,900) cared for at Taipei City Hospital from January 2019 to April 2020 were divided into three time points: January–April 2019 (before COVID-19), May–December 2019 (interim), and January–April 2020 (during COVID-19). This cohort study compared the monthly utilization of hospice services before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Results There was no significant difference in hospice home visits (194 vs. 184; P = 0.686) and new enrollments (15 vs. 14; P = 0.743) to hospice home care before and during the pandemic. However, the bed occupancy rate in hospice units in the hospital was significantly reduced from 66.2% before the pandemic to 37.4% during the pandemic ( P = 0.029), whereas that in nonhospice units had a nonsignificant decrease from 81.6% before the pandemic to 71.8% during the pandemic ( P = 0.086). During the pandemic, the number of inpatient days was affected more severely in hospice units than in nonhospice units (−42.4% vs. −10.9%; P = 0.029). Conclusions This study suggests that hospice home care services were maintained during the COVID-19 pandemic, while the utilization of hospice inpatient care services reduced. Home care for hospice patients is an essential component of palliative care during a pandemic.

Taiwanese women with endometriosis really had a risk of newly developed EOC, especially those who had a surgical diagnosis, and this three-fold increase of risk was neither influenced by exposure time nor biased by surveillance.

This study examined the ability of the Clinical Care Classification system to represent nursing record data across various nursing specialties. The data comprised nursing care plan records from December 1998 to October 2008 in a medical center. The total number of care plan documentation we analyzed was 2 060 178, and we used a process of knowledge discovery in datasets for data analysis. The results showed that 75.42% of the documented diagnosis terms could be mapped using the Clinical Care Classification system. However, a difference in nursing terminology emerged among various nursing specialties, ranging from 0.1% for otorhinolaryngology to 100% for colorectal surgery and plastic surgery. The top five nursing diagnoses were identified as knowledge deficit, acute pain, infection risk, falling risk, and bleeding risk, which were the most common health problems in an acute care setting but not in non-acute care settings. Overall, we identified a total of 21 established nursing diagnoses, which we recommend adding to the Clinical Care Classification system, most of which are applicable to emergency and intensive care specialties. Our results show that Clinical Care Classification is useful for documenting patient's problems in an acute setting, but we suggest adding new diagnoses to identify health problems in specialty settings.

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