How Are Palliative Care Cancer Populations Characterized in Randomized Controlled Trials? A Literature Review

Abstract Context The difficulties in defining a palliative care patient accentuate the need to provide stringent descriptions of the patient population in palliative care research. Objectives To conduct a systematic literature review with the aim of identifying which key variables have been used to describe adult palliative care cancer populations in randomized controlled trials (RCTs). Methods The data sources used were MEDLINE (1950 to January 25, 2010) and Embase (1980 to January 25, 2010), limited to RCTs in adult cancer patients with incurable disease. Forty-three variables were systematically extracted from the eligible articles. Results The review includes 336 articles reporting RCTs in palliative care cancer patients. Age (98%), gender (90%), cancer diagnosis (89%), performance status (45%), and survival (45%) were the most frequently reported variables. A large number of other variables were much less frequently reported. Conclusion A substantial variation exists in how palliative care cancer populations are described in RCTs. Few variables are consistently registered and reported. There is a clear need to standardize the reporting. The results from this work will serve as the basis for an international Delphi process with the aim of reaching consensus on a minimum set of descriptors to characterize a palliative care cancer population.