Health Professionals’ Perspectives of the Role of Palliative Care During COVID-19: Content Analysis of Articles and Blogs Posted on Twitter

Abstract

Objective: The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in health professionals facing unprecedented challenges and changes in practice. Responding to humanitarian crises involves saving lives and reducing suffering and as such, palliative care is an essential component of the response to COVID-19. This study aimed to explore health professionals’ perspectives of the role of palliative care during the COVID-19 pandemic by analyzing their views and experiences expressed in articles and blogs located via Twitter. Method: Qualitative content analysis of 33 online articles and blogs written by health professionals from 1 February 2020 to 30 June 2020. Online articles and blogs were included if the URL was posted on Twitter. The consolidated criteria for reporting qualitative research (COREQ) guided data collection and reporting. Results: The health professionals whose viewpoints were analyzed were from Europe, North America, Oceania and Asia. The themes derived from content analysis were (a) the recognized value of palliative care during the pandemic, (b) positioning palliative care as every health professional’s responsibility and (c) specialist palliative care supporting and guiding health professionals Conclusions: This study utilizes a unique approach to exploring the perspectives of health professionals from several countries during a global pandemic. The study emphasizes the value of palliative care and identifies gaps in end-of-life care provision including resource allocation. This brings to light the urgent need to equip all health professionals with palliative care knowledge and skills, including discussing and planning care. Specialist palliative care teams are well placed to support health professionals to provide quality care.

The COVID-19 Pandemic: Early Ripple Effects in Pediatric Palliative Care

“…Hospital systems throughout the world-particularly those in World Bank low and middle income (LMIC) economies-were suddenly faced with budgetary constraints forcing reductions in staff, reallocations of already scarce physical space and other resources, and the dissolution of clinical teams judged to be less critical to institutional missions [15,16]. Concerns over pathogen transmission through aerosols have mandated the use of safety protocols, such as the use of social distancing, personal protective equipment (PPE) and special isolation measures within hospitals that were found to be effective in other pandemics [13].…”

“…In other words, the "illness clock" never pauses-it simply marches on-or even accelerates as access to routine healthcare services for vaccine-preventable diseases of childhood, becomes more difficult even for healthy children. It is also important to note that it is known that significant underlying chronic illnesses are risk factors for severe and fatal COVID-19 infection [15].…”

“…Fortunately, palliative care services-including pediatric teams-are comprised of highly dedicated, compassionate individuals who are resilient and hard-wired to help the suffering. Palliative care teams-even pediatric teams-have been able to pivot to provide a supportive presence to all healthcare workers, particularly in hospital settings where so many adults have been dying alone despite the heroic efforts of their clinical teams [15]. This has been an unimaginably stressful experience for frontline clinicians witnessing several patients dying during a single shift.…”

“…Some hospital-based palliative care clinicians, which were previously regarded as belonging to secondary "filler services", are now viewed and respected as indispensable colleagues, able to mitigate suffering in a large number of seriously ill and dying patients of all ages [15]. With patience and humility, palliative care professionals have earned not only trust but have also been afforded the opportunity to teach "other" teams the essential instruments in our "toolkit"-particularly the essential tools of communication, teamwork, care of dying patients and their families, especially when symptom control is challenging at the end of life [15]. The pandemic has also raised self-awareness regarding woefully inadequate self-care in healthcare workers [14,22,31].…”

Managing the end of life in COVID patients. The role of palliative care in emergency departments during the pandemic

“…In this situation, palliative care teams provided support in many COVID wards, trying not only to manage the end of life of dying patients, but also to help colleagues by providing them with professional and psychological support (Singh et al, 2021 ).…”