Prognosis Prediction Models and their Clinical Utility in Palliative Care

Abstract

Prognosis prediction is a clinically relevant issue to facilitate optimal decision-making for both physicians and patients with cancer. Many previous studies revealed that prognosis prediction based on the physician's intuition and/or clinical experience is inaccurate and often optimistic, which means that there is a tendency to overestimate patient survival in daily clinical practice. In recent decades, many eforts have been made to develop prognosis prediction models which aid physicians to make more accurate prognosis prediction. In this chapter, we review the representative prognosis prediction models in palliative care and related studies. In addition, we refer to several prognosis prediction models developed by unique methods (for instance, case-crossover design or machine learning). Finally, we focus on the possible clinical utility of prognosis prediction models. In fact, no previous studies have clearly demonstrated whether the application of such prognosis prediction models truly beneits patient care in daily clinical practice.Therefore, we will discuss how the application of prognosis prediction models could beneit patients under palliative care.

Communication with Families in the Last Days of a Patient’s Life and Optimal Delivery of a Death Pronouncement

“…Several userfriendly clinical tools have been developed in previous studies, such as the palliative prognostic score, the palliative prognostic index, and prognostic in palliative care study predictor models [49][50][51]. Detailed discussion regarding this topic is described elsewhere [52].…”