CN26HOPEVOL: Hospice care appropriate to the wishes and needs of patients in the palliative terminal phase

Abstract Background In the Netherlands, hospice care is provided in professional-driven hospices and volunteer-driven hospices. To date, insight is lacking whether the care provided in hospices is appropriate to meet the patient’s needs and wishes. The aim is to gain insight into the characteristics of patients admitted in hospices, their needs and wishes and the care they receive. Methods A retrospective patient record study of 1200 hospice patients in the Netherlands. Preliminary results are shown for the first 203 patients. Inclusion criteria are deceased, adult patients admitted in hospice in 2017-2018.The following outcomes were included: Patient characteristics: demographics, disease characteristics, multidimensional symptoms, needs and wishes. Care characteristics: measurement instruments and multidimensional care. Descriptive statistisc was used for analyses. Results Preliminary results of 203 patients (mean age 74.8 years, 51.8% woman, 84% cancer diagnoses) from 13 hospices show that initiative for admission is mostly taken by the patient or their family (65.7%). Reasons for admission were described as physical symptoms (73.1%), preferred location of dying (16.1%) and social problems (9.7%). Patients were mostly admitted for last-resort (96.4%) and most patients were in the phase of symptom palliation (79.4%). Problems that were most described were delirium (18.6%), decubitus (12.4%) and edema (6.2%). On average, 10.6 interventions were performed in the first 72 hours per patient. Most were within the physical dimension (76.6%) and least in the social dimension (2.3%). Of the 11 different measurement tools identified, a symptom diary (20.7%) and a palliative assessment (17.2%) were most frequent used. Conclusions A preliminary overview of hospice patients and the care they receive was presented. The study is work in progress. Additional data and a comparison between organizational structures of hospices will be presented during the congress. Editorial acknowledgement R. Koorn, F. van der Baan, E. de Graaf, S. Teunissen. Legal entity responsible for the study S.C.C.M. Teunissen. Funding ZonMw. Disclosure The author has declared no conflicts of interest.