PubMed Health⌕ Search

Biomedical subjects

David E Weissman

Publications and source records attributed to David E Weissman.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2005

Education in palliative care.

Palliative care education includes the domains of pain and nonpain symptom management, communications skills, ethics and law, psychosocial care, and health systems. Defining key attitudes, knowledge, and skill objectives, and matching these to appropriate learning formats, is essential in educational planning. Abundant educational resource material is available to support classroom and experiential palliative care training.

Bioethics↗
PubMed2005

Training of palliative medicine fellows: a report from the field.

BACKGROUND: The escalating demand for palliative care physicians has led to the proliferation of postgraduate fellowship programs to train physicians in the United States and Canada. There is currently little data regarding the extent to which clinical, research, educational or administrative skills and competencies have been incorporated into fellowship training. OBJECTIVE: The survey aims were to describe: (1) fellows' interests and relative priorities for receiving training in the clinical, educational, research, and administrative aspects of palliative medicine; (2) quantity of training received in each area; (3) fellows' satisfaction with the teaching received in each area; (4) post-fellowship employment experiences. DESIGN: A survey was conducted via mail and in person, with e-mail utilized for reminders. SETTING/SUBJECTS: All palliative medicine fellows from the United States and Canada between 1997 and 2002 were surveyed. MEASUREMENTS: The survey instrument was based on a Health Resources Services Administration (HRSA) survey designed to assess research fellows' educational experiences and training satisfaction and modified to ensure sufficient focus on clinical, education, research and administrative activities; specific palliative medicine content was added. RESULTS: One hundred one fellows from 24 programs were identified; contact information was obtained from program directors for 89 fellows (88%). Sixty-seven valid surveys were received for a response rate of 75%; 22 programs (14 U.S., 8 Canadian, 92% of active fellowships) are represented. The vast majority of fellows (94%) identified clinical training as very important; 63% identified educational training as important and only few (33% and 21%, respectively) identified research or administrative training as very important. Fellows reported receiving less training on research and administrative topics than they did on clinical or educational topics. Sixty-eight percent of fellows reported spending 10% or less of their time on research activities, and subsequently fellows reported low levels of research competence. Fellows were very satisfied with their clinical training (mean rating = 4.51 on a 5-point scale), intermediately satisfied with their educational training (mean rating = 3.61) and less with their research (mean rating = 3.1) and administrative training (mean rating = 2.24). The largest proportion of fellows (73%) described their first post fellowship position as "clinician/educator" or "full time clinician"; only 14% were "clinician/researchers." CONCLUSION: Clinical training appears to be both the focus and strength of most palliative care fellowships surveyed. Fellows appear less interested in educational, research, and administrative training and programs appear to be less focused on these aspects of palliative medicine. Fellows also express a lower level of satisfaction with their training in these areas. The scope of fellowship programs must broaden to provide fellows opportunities to develop the research, education and administrative skills necessary to strengthen the research base of the field and provide academic leadership for the future.

Adult↗
PubMed2004

Decision making at a time of crisis near the end of life.

As patients approach the end of life, their disease process may create an immediate life-threatening emergency, yet invasive interventions may be less likely to provide benefit while carrying the same or greater risks. Knowing when it is time to shift from life-prolonging to more palliative approaches, focused on quality of life and comfort, is emotionally and clinically challenging for patients, families, and physicians. Key factors in the decision process include prognosis, risk-benefit analysis of the proposed intervention, current symptom burden, temporal pattern of the illness, patient's age and life stage, and the patient's goals of care. A structured approach to decision making includes assessing the patient's physical, psychological, and spiritual needs; assessing the patient's support system; discussing prognosis; and assessing patient-specific goals. Physicians can best help patients decide which treatments are appropriate by taking the necessary time to explore all curative and palliative care options, providing honest and timely prognostic information, making clear recommendations, facilitating patient-family discussions, and affirming patient choices.

Advance Care Planning↗
PubMed2004

Opioid dose titration for severe cancer pain: a systematic evidence-based review.

Dosing strategies to achieve rapid analgesia in patients with severe or crescendo cancer pain are important. A systematic review of research trials for treatment of severe or crescendo cancer pain was conducted; nine studies were identified. Eight trials were prospective; two were randomized between different dosing strategies. Dosing frequency predicted onset to analgesia regardless of baseline opioid dose. None of the trials were associated with evidence of respiratory depression. The studies all suffered significant methodological problems limiting broad conclusions. Until better data exist, opioid dose titration for severe/crescendo pain will be guided by expert opinion and experience.

Analgesics, Opioid↗