Psychological and existential distress of terminally-ill patients Mental and Behavioural Disorders
Conditions
Interventions
Standard palliative care:
Standard palliative care (SPC) consisted of a multi-professional palliative care team assessment, including nurses, a psychologist, a psychosocial worker and clinical care de
range 10-30) consisted of clinical interview, physical examination, symptom assessment and management, addressing patients and families questions as well as family and patients coping, illness and tre
Sponsors
University of Lisbon (Portugal)
Eligibility
Sex/Gender
All
Inclusion criteria
Inclusion criteria: 1. Age = 18 years old 2. Patient with a life-threatening disease 3. Patient able to read and speak Portuguese 4. Patient able to provide written informed consent 5. Patient with no evidence or diagnosis of dementia or delirium, demonstrated by information on medical chart or by clinical consensus between the main investigator and another palliative care physician 6. Mini Mental State score = 20 7. Availability to have 4 to 5 research encounters, over a period of one month
Exclusion criteria
Exclusion criteria: Patients enrolled on other palliative care programs
Design outcomes
Primary
| Measure | Time frame |
|---|---|
| To determine the efficacy of DT in reducing depression symptoms | — |
Secondary
| Measure | Time frame |
|---|---|
| 1. The efficacy of DT on the following psychosocial and existential aspects: anxiety symptoms; demoralization; desire for death; sense of dignity; patients? satisfaction, helpfulness, sense of meaning and purpose after performing dignity therapy; and physical symptoms. 1.1. Depression and anxiety: Hospital and Anxiety Depression Scale (HADS) 1.2. Demoralization: Demoralization Criteria 1.3. Desire for Death: Desire for Death Rating Scale (DDRS) 1.4. Sense of Dignity: Patient Dignity Inventory (PDI) 1.5. Satisfaction with dignity therapy: Patient Dignity Questionnaire (PDQ) 1.6. Physical Symptoms: Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale (ESAS) 2. The prevalence of depression, anxiety, demoralization and desire for death 3. Brief feasibility analysis of DT and a qualitative analysis of the content of all generativity documents Day 1: collection of demographic and clinical data (T0) Day 2: baseline assessment using all the scales mentioned above (with the exception of PDQ), before dignity therapy or standard palliative care (T1) Day 7, 8 or 9: post-intervention assessment using all scales mentioned above (T2) Day 15: assessment using HADS and ESAS (T3) Day 30: assessment using HADS and ESAS (T4) | — |
Countries
Portugal
Outcome results
None listed