Study Finds Need for Improved End-of-Life Care for Parents With Terminal Cancer
Care for mothers with terminal cancer could be improved to help resolve their psychological distress and to help surviving family members cope, a study by University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers have found. Based on the study findings published by Park et al in the journal BMJ Palliative Care, additional research and improved end-of-life care are needed to help dying parents and their families.
Researchers surveyed 344 widowed fathers who had lost a spouse to cancer and were raising dependent children. Based on responses from surviving fathers, they found that mothers with terminal cancer had substantial worries about their children at the end of their lives and low levels of peacefulness.
“The major finding of this study was that end-of-life care for dying mothers can be improved and that they experience significant psychological distress at the end of life and that this may be related,” said Eliza Park, MD, a UNC Lineberger member and Assistant Professor of Psychiatry in the UNC School of Medicine. “Our research indicates that end-of-life programs need to be more specific and intensified for this particular subgroup that tends to be highly distressed at the end of life.”
Study Findings
According to the surviving fathers, many of the women in the study had not said goodbye to their spouses and to their children. Thirty-eight percent of mothers had not said goodbye to their children, according to reports from the fathers, and 26% were not at all “at peace with dying.”
Moreover, 90% of widowed fathers reported that their spouse was worried about the strain on their children at end of life. However, fathers whose wives had received hospice services were more likely to report that they had said goodbye to their wives, and that their wives had said goodbye to their children.
The study also found links to the mother’s end-of-life experience and the level of depression and grief experienced by the surviving parent. Fathers who reported clearer communication between their wives and their physicians about the wife’s condition had lower scores on tests for depression and grief.
“We also found that the depression and bereavement that surviving caregivers experienced was directly linked to the degree of psychological distress that the mother experienced at the end of her life,” Dr. Park said. “Therefore, if we were to devise interventions to improve the care of the mother, we could likely expect that to improve care for the surviving family members as well.”
Based on the findings, the researchers called for additional research into how to better improve care for patients with terminal cancer and their families and pointed to a need for “substantial improvement” in end-of-life care for dying mothers with cancer.
The content in this post has not been reviewed by the American Society of Clinical Oncology, Inc. (ASCO®) and does not necessarily reflect the ideas and opinions of ASCO®.
