Does Not Increase Anxiety
When your patient with cancer is terminally ill and you have a good sense of the short prognosis, should you tell him? It is a well-established practice for American physicians to be forthcoming about prognosis, but not so well established when death is just around the corner.
A study recently published online suggests that keeping the patient fully informed in the final days means that they are more likely to have their preferences met and to die in their preferred place. Their family members are also more likely to be prepared for the death and to be offered bereavement support.
Researchers in Sweden looked at more than 1,000 cases in which patients were informed of their imminent death and compared this with a similar number who were not informed. Results showed no differences with regard to pain control, nausea, anxiety, confusion, respiratory tract secretions and other end-of-life symptoms.
“People vary about the extent they want to know the truth, if they want to know at all, and in their understanding of what constitutes telling the truth,” the authors wrote. But, they concluded, “being informed about imminent death does not lead to more unrelieved pain and anxiety during the last week of life.”
The study concludes that, “providing information of imminent death to a patient with cancer at the end of life does not seem to increase pain or anxiety, but it does seem to be associated with improved care and to increase the likelihood of fulfilling the principles of a good death.”
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