Context:The care of sick members is the hallmark of a civilized society. End-of-life care and social security for elderly are emerging issues nowadays.Aims:The aim of this study is to explore the desires of the elderly regarding the end-of-life care decisions along with to find out social security measures among the study population.Settings and Design:The cross-sectional study conducted in the geriatric outpatient department of a tertiary care hospital.Subjects and Methods:The study period was 4 months from August to November 2017. The geriatric patients attending geriatric outpatient department were interviewed using a predesigned and pretested questionnaire. Convenient sampling was used and a total of 138 participants were included in the study.Statistical Analysis Used:Proportions were used in the study.Results:A total of 63.77% participants expected to die at home surrounded by their family members during their time of death followed by hospital (31.88%). Majority (63.77%) stated their opinions to die a senile death. Organ donation after death was the willingness shown by as high as 70.3%, but registered organ donors were 6.5%. 94.2% participants expected to be cremated after their death while others buried in accord to their religious practices. Only 7.24% of participants had a legal will of their financial establishments. It was observed that even half of the population (47.8%) did not have any form of health or life insurance.Conclusion:Home-based care of the elderly is needed so that they can live their last days of life peacefully. Awareness about health and life insurance should be increased by urgent intervention.
Introduction: To find out palliative care practices among physicians providing care to terminally ill cancer patients.
Methods: The study was cross-sectional in nature, conducted in a tertiary care hospital from July 2015 to September 2017 using a predesigned and pretested questionnaire among physicians providing care to terminally ill cancer patients. A universal sample of 42 doctors involved in providing health services to terminally ill cancer patients were included in. The analysis was done using SPSS v. 20.0.
Results: Most of the physicians involved in care giving to the terminally ill were specialist care providers (67%) and only 1/5th of the physicians had received training on palliative care. Physicians who had either had training or had a personal loss of near and dear one through the state of terminal illness showed much compassionate care giving attitude. 83% physicians had a positive care giving attitude towards their patients.
Conclusion: Family and physician interactions need to be improved so as to facilitate better care for the terminally ill patients. There should be regular trainings organised for physicians and other health care providers dealing with terminal illness so they can provide best palliative care to their patients.
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