Preferences for place of death if faced with advanced cancer: a population survey in England, Flanders, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain

Background Cancer end-of-life care (EoLC) policies assume people want to die at home. We aimed to examine variations in preferences for place of death cross-nationally. Methods A telephone survey of a random sample of individuals aged ≥16 in England, Flanders, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. We determined where people would prefer to die if they had a serious illness such as advanced cancer, facilitating circumstances, personal values and experiences of illness, death and dying. Results Of 9344 participants, between 51% (95% CI: 48% to 54%) in Portugal and 84% (95% CI: 82%... Mehr ...

Verfasser: Gomes, B.
Higginson, I. J.
Calanzani, N.
Cohen, J.
Deliens, L.
Daveson, B. A.
Bechinger-English, D.
Bausewein, C.
Ferreira, P. L.
Toscani, F.
Meñaca, A.
Gysels, M.
Ceulemans, L.
Simon, S. T.
Pasman, H. R. W.
Albers, G.
Hall, S.
Murtagh, F. E. M.
Haugen, D. F.
Downing, J.
Koffman, J.
Pettenati, F.
Finetti, S.
Antunes, B.
Harding, R.
on behalf of PRISMA
Dokumenttyp: TEXT
Erscheinungsdatum: 2012
Verlag/Hrsg.: Oxford University Press
Schlagwörter: palliative care
Sprache: Englisch
Permalink: https://search.fid-benelux.de/Record/base-29055058
Datenquelle: BASE; Originalkatalog
Powered By: BASE
Link(s) : http://annonc.oxfordjournals.org/cgi/content/short/23/8/2006

Background Cancer end-of-life care (EoLC) policies assume people want to die at home. We aimed to examine variations in preferences for place of death cross-nationally. Methods A telephone survey of a random sample of individuals aged ≥16 in England, Flanders, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain. We determined where people would prefer to die if they had a serious illness such as advanced cancer, facilitating circumstances, personal values and experiences of illness, death and dying. Results Of 9344 participants, between 51% (95% CI: 48% to 54%) in Portugal and 84% (95% CI: 82% to 86%) in the Netherlands would prefer to die at home. Cross-national analysis found there to be an influence of circumstances and values but not of experiences of illness, death and dying. Four factors were associated with a preference for home death in more than one country: younger age up to 70+ (Germany, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain), increased importance of dying in the preferred place (England, Germany, Portugal, Spain), prioritizing keeping a positive attitude (Germany, Spain) and wanting to involve family in decisions if incapable (Flanders, Portugal). Conclusions At least two-thirds of people prefer a home death in all but one country studied. The strong association with personal values suggests keeping home care at the heart of cancer EoLC.