A Tripartite Model of Community Attitudes to Palliative Care

Abstract

Background: Despite a growth in palliative care services, access and referral patterns are inconsistent and only a minority of people who would benefit from such care receive it. Use of palliative care is also affected by community attitudes toward palliative care. As such, determining community attitudes toward palliative care is crucial. We also need to determine what predicts attitudes in order to provide appropriate information and education. Objectives: The 2 research questions were: (1) What are community attitudes toward palliative care? and (2) what are the determinants of community attitudes toward palliative care? Design: A tripartite model of attitudes was used, which articulates attitudes as comprising knowledge and experience, emotions, and beliefs. A cross-sectional descriptive survey was used. Participants: A community sample of 180 participants completed the survey. Results: The average attitude and belief responses were very positive, the average emotions responses were somewhat positive. The sample had good knowledge of palliative care. Lowest knowledge scores were reported for the items: “Euthanasia is not part of palliative care,” “Palliative care does not prolong or shorten life,” and “Specialist palliative care is only available in hospitals.” After controlling place of birth and age, it was found that beliefs, emotions, and knowledge each accounted for a significant proportion of unique variance in attitude toward palliative care. Each variable had a positive relationship with attitude. Conclusion: Beliefs, emotions, and knowledge all need to be incorporated into palliative care community education programs.

Natural Death Versus Known Date-Of-Death: A Qualitative Study of Views on Voluntary Assisted Dying in an Online Course About Death

“…Some participants in the present study appeared influenced by having observed a ‘bad death’ (Wilson & Hewitt, 2018), or had views on what a ‘good death’ (Read & MacBride-Stewart, 2018) should look like, both highly individualised and subjective concepts usually based on experience. Some proposed VAD as a way of mitigating suffering (Beuthin et al, 2018) with palliative care proposed by some as a way of addressing pain and suffering (O'Connor et al, 2019), but others finding it to be lacking and not always accessible or adequate to meet all needs (Hayry, 2018). Being in pain at the end of life was certainly a consideration by some, with VAD seen as a way of avoiding this.…”

Factors Influencing Public Awareness of and Attitudes Toward Palliative Care: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of the 2018 HINTS Data

“…Extant literature on awareness of and attitudes toward palliative care are mainly descriptive, outlining health care professionals and the publics' awareness, attitudes and perceptions toward palliative care with mixed results [e.g., ( 12 , 21 – 25 )]. While some research found that most people had positive attitudes and good knowledge of palliative care ( 24 , 25 ), other studies found the opposite ( 12 , 21 , 23 , 26 ). Thus, it is important to address the prior inconsistent findings and further examine public awareness of and attitudes toward palliative care.…”

Attitudes towards dementia among Chinese adults aged 50 years and older: a comparative study of immigrants living in Melbourne and nonimmigrants living in Beijing

“…Hence, in this study, the tripartite model of attitudes was selected as the conceptualized structure of dementia attitudes to gain a comprehensive understanding of how people think about dementia or PLWD (Rosenberg et al, 1960). This model, developed by Rosenberg et al, is widely used to understand attitudes towards various diseases and palliative care and guided the development of the Dementia Attitude Scales (O'Connor et al, 2019;O'Connor and McFadden, 2010). In this model, attitude consists of three measurable components: affective, cognitive, and behavioral.…”