Background. For many years virtual reality (VR) has been used to support therapy in many clinical contexts. This study aimed to investigate the effectiveness of VR as an intervention to reduce ...distress and increase patient comfort during chemotherapy. Participants and Procedure. Twenty-six adult patients of the Haematology Clinic participated in the between-group design study. The experimental group used a VR application during three chemotherapy sessions, while the control group underwent treatment as usual.Participants' task in VR was to locate and destroy cancer cells using drug particles emitted from a virtual weapon. Several self-report measures were used, measuring attitudes towards the chemotherapy session, experiences during the session, items related to using visualization techniques, and questions related to evaluating the VR application.Results. We found a significant difference between groups regarding the experience of the session. Participants in the experimental group reported more sense of control over the treatment process, higher levels of physical comfort, and relaxation. We discuss the implications of these results in various contexts, including gender differences, age, and time between chemotherapy sessions.Conclusions. Virtual Reality applications can effectively influence the experience of the chemotherapy session positively. Its use can also affect the psychological aspects of a patient's treatment process.
Purpose:
Hospice and palliative medicine (HPM) have been gaining ground especially in large urban settings. However, less is known about their perception in small rural areas. This study assessed the ...awareness and perception of a rural oncology population of this field and the effects of prognosis on their awareness.
Methods:
Subjects were patients of the community cancer center in rural Clarion County, Pennsylvania, who volunteered to complete a short nine-question survey (
supplemental figure
). Results were analyzed based on completed surveys.
Results:
A total of 65 surveys were collected from the Cancer Center at the Clarion Hospital. Among these patients, 54% stated that they have heard of palliative and hospice medicine. When correlating patient-reported prognosis with their awareness of palliative and hospice care, 100% of the patients with poor prognosis were aware of palliative or hospice care, respectively. In contrast, only <20% of patients with reported good prognosis were aware of HPM.
Conclusions:
Our study has shown that the awareness of HPM in rural areas is improving. It was observed that more patients are aware of HPM is when their prognosis was poor as compared with those who reported good prognosis.
Infection often occurs in children with malignant hematology and causes morbidity and mortality in the children. Antibiotics given must be based on culture results and antibiotic sensitivity testing. ...This study was aimed to obtain the microbial pattern and sensitivity test in children hospitalized in the Hemato-Oncology Ward, dr. Soetomo Hospital from September 2012 - February 2013. This was a descriptive study. Data were obtained from the patients’ medical records in Dr. Soetomo Hospital. There were 341 culture examinations (blood, urine, rectum swab, faecal, and others) from 88 patients (44 males and 44 females). Most of patients´ age was < 5 years (58%) and suffered from ALL (50%).There were microbial (83 of culture) and yeast (15 of culture) growth out of 98 cultures. Escherichia coli, Burkholderia cefacea, and Klebsiella oxytoca (Gram negative) dan CONS, Stapyloccocus aureus, and Stapylococcus sapropyticus (gram positive) were found in blood culture. S. aureus (gram positive) and E. coli, Klebsiella pneumoniae, and B. cefacea (gram negative) were found in urine culture. Only E. coli was found in rectal swab culture. CONS of gram positive cocci were mostly found in blood culture of children hospitalized in Hemato-Oncology Ward, Dr. Soetomo Hospital. E. coli was the mostly found gram negative rods. Gram positive cocci showed a high resistant to penicillin and co-trimoxazole. E. coli, mostly found in rectal swab and urine, has a high sensitivity to amikacin and meropenem, but highly resistant to ampicillin and ampicillin sulbactam.
Background
Patients with advanced malignancies have historically been considered poor candidates for admission to the intensive care unit (ICU); however, prognosis is continually improving, and ...requirements for ICU access are increasing.
Aim
To understand the characteristics and outcomes of oncology unit patients admitted to an Australian ICU and identify potential prognostic factors.
Methods
A single‐centre, retrospective, cohort study conducted at a tertiary public hospital with a quaternary ICU in Sydney, Australia. All patients admitted under the medical oncology team requiring ICU admission between June 2014 and June 2016 were evaluated. Clinical outcomes were determined including mortality, ICU requirements (ventilation, dialysis, vasopressors, infection) and prognostic scores (Acute Physiologic and Chronic Health Evaluation (APACHE) II and Sequential Organ Failure Assessment (SOFA) score).
Results
There were 96 patients with mean age 61 years, 58% were male and 76% had metastatic disease. Most were receiving palliative treatment (89%), with recent chemotherapy (43%), immunotherapy (10%) and other therapies (5%). Of the 10 patients with recent immunotherapy, three (all with melanoma) required ICU admission due to immunotoxicity; 13% were admitted due to an oncological emergency. Mean APACHE II score was 17 (standard deviation (SD) 5.33), mean SOFA score was 3.99 (SD 2.70), ICU mortality was 5% and hospital mortality was 22%. Using multivariate logistic regression analysis, cancer stage, infection during ICU admission, intracranial mass effect on ICU admission and SOFA score were associated with 30‐day mortality.
Conclusion
Our patient population had good short‐term survival outcomes despite most receiving palliative treatment. Cancer patients can achieve positive outcomes after ICU admission, and appropriate selection of patients is crucial.
To discuss the evolution and effectiveness of the comprehensive geriatric assessment (CGA), the need for interprofessional collaboration, and the role of oncology nurses in the assessment and care ...coordination of the older patient with cancer.
Historical and recent publications.
Oncology nurses collect and synthesize geriatric data and can be a central resource to the multidisciplinary team.
Oncology nurses can incorporate CGA and results into their practice to enhance the care of the older person.
•Acute hospital-based care can be high cost and potentially lower quality of care.•Unplanned hospitalizations are potentially preventable.•Evidence-based acute care decreased unplanned oncology ...hospitalization and cost.
Advances in cancer treatment has resulted in more oncology patients receiving outpatient therapy; however, this can promote a greater use of costly hospital-based acute care.
The Oncology Evaluation and Treatment Center (OETC) was established in March 2012 at Baylor University Medical Center (BUMC), a large urban hospital, as a quality improvement intervention to reduce oncology patient acute care and cost. The OETC provides after-hours acute care for oncology patients receiving outpatient care at BUMC. OETC care included optimal use of evidence-based cancer supportive care.
The intervention group included oncology patients who accessed the OETC and potentially BUMC emergency department (ED) during the study period. The control group included oncology patients who only accessed BUMC ED during this time.
March 1, 2012 through June 30, 2018, a total of 8335 unique oncology patients utilized the BUMC inpatient and outpatient settings (OETC and ED) for acute care.
Oncology-related unplanned hospitalizations per 100 outpatient visits were lower in the intervention versus control group (27·3 versus 32·7, P < 0·0001). Furthermore, there was no difference in the average annual cost for outpatient acute care (OETC and ED) between the two groups ($6368 versus $6,593, P = 0·35), but the cost was lower for oncology-related unplanned hospitalizations in the intervention group ($62,260 versus $81,911, P < 0·0001). This translated to $19,651 annual savings for unplanned hospitalizations for the intervention group.
Providing optimal use of evidence-based cancer supportive care to oncology patients in a dedicated acute care setting decreased oncology-related unplanned hospitalizations and related costs.
This review focuses on the modern treatment of breakthrough pain in cancer patients with the application of transmucosal fentanyl. Pain is one of the most common and severe problem that is ...significantly worse the quality of life of cancer patients. The prevalence of pain in this population is estimated to be high and increases with disease progression. For about 80% of cancer patients experience chronic pain. The separate problem of the cancer pain treatment is so-called treatment of breakthrough pain.
The purpose of this study was to assess the oncology patientsʼ spiritual needs and activities. Besides, the study was to provide clinical evaluation of the feasibility and usefulness of the Patients ...Spiritual Needs Assessment Scale. This descriptive and cross-sectional study was performed by using a demographic and spiritual practices questionnaire, the Turkish version of the Patients Spiritual Needs Assessment Scale. The results of our study demonstrated that the most common spiritual needs of patients with cancer were “to address issues before death and dying” (100%), “feel a sense of peace and contentment” (94.8%), and “for companionship” (93.5%). Spiritually assessing a patient with cancer requires knowledge of how spiritual needs may manifest and how to talk with a client about his or her spiritual needs. These findings can help nurses to begin this process of providing spiritual care for patients with cancer.
Abstract Purpose Questions asked by patients during consultations reflect their most immediate information needs. The aim of this study is to observe the frequency and type of questions asked by ...Italian breast cancer patients and to explore associated factors. Methods Breast cancer patients at their first meeting with the oncologist were asked to complete five questionnaires (STAI-X1, PHQ-9, GHQ-12, CPS and DSES) before the consultation and three other questionnaires (PEI, SDM-Q, SWD) after. Consultations were audio taped and subsequently analyzed for the content and number of questions to identify patients' information requests. Results Patients asked an average of 18 questions, mainly about illness management: patients who were prescribed chemo-therapy asked more questions (t = −3.17, dof = 23.45, p < 0.01). Other factors related to a greater number of questions were younger age (r = −0.24, p = 0.05), being employed (t-test = 0.32; p = 0.04), and longer consultation length (r = 0.47, p < 0.01). Conclusion Italian breast cancer patients asked on average more questions than in other countries. Knowledge of the factors associated with information needs can contribute to achieve a major involvement and consequently a better quality of patient-centered care.
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