Innovation: Establish formal weekly discussions of patients with prolonged PICU stay to reduce healthcare providers' moral distress and decreases length of stay for patients with lifethreatening illnesses.Evaluation: Pre/post intervention design measuring provider moral distress and comparing patient outcomes using retrospective historical controls.Setting: Pediatric Intensive Care Unit in a quaternary care Children's Hospital.
Participants: Physicians and nurses on staff in the unit.Patients: There were 60 patients in the interventional and 66 patients in the historical control group.Intervention: Over a year, weekly meetings (PEACE rounds) to establish goals of care for patients with longer than 10 days length of stay in the ICU.
Results:Moral distress scores measured intermittently with the MDT fluctuated. "Clinical situations" represented the most frequent contributing factor to moral distress. Post intervention, overall MDS-R scores were lower for respondents in all categories (non-significant), and on three specific items (significant). Patient outcomes before and after PEACE intervention showed a statistically significant decrease in PRISM indexed LOS (4.94 control vs 3.37 PEACE, p=0.015), a statistically significant increase in both code status changes DNR (11% control, 28% PEACE, p=0.013), and in-hospital death (9% control, 25% PEACE, p=0.015), with no change in patient 30 or 365 day mortality.
Conclusion:The addition of a clinical ethicist and senior intensivist to weekly interprofessional team meetings facilitates difficult conversations regarding realistic goals of care. The PEACE