Analysis of knowledge, attitude and behavior of oncology medical staff in palliative care

The incidence of cancer has risen as the population has grown older. For patients with advanced cancer and limited survival, palliative care (PC) is especially urgent and important. In this study, we analyzed the knowledge, attitude, and behavior of oncology medical staff in PC at one hospital.

A questionnaire ("knowledge, Attitude and Behavior Questionnaire for PCs of Oncology Medical Staff") designed to investigate 167 oncology members of medical staff serving at the Affiliated Tumor Hospital of Harbin Medical University in China. After obtaining the consent of the respondents, a pair of questionnaires were sent and recovered.

(I) Awareness survey of oncologist medical staff members on PC of the four issues, the awareness part with Q2 (PC service should not be provided with cancer treatment at the same time) the highest accuracy, Q1-Q4 all correct proportion of 39.61%; (II) the majority of the oncology medical staff members questioned (73.38%) believed that when patients can no longer accept surgery, radiotherapy, chemotherapy and other anti-cancer treatment, when a patient's symptoms cannot be controlled (55.19%), or when estimated survival time is <3 months (57.76%), PC service should be accepted. Meanwhile, 28.57% of oncology medical staff believed that they would recommend PC to tumor patients on their first visit to the hospital, 18.83% thought that patients should be informed of the prognosis information, and 40.26% indicated that they were more willing to inform the patient's family/caregiver of the diagnosis and prognosis. In relation to behavior, more than half of respondents said that when conflict arises between patients who would prefer to stop receiving life-sustaining treatment and their family members, the will of the patient should be followed, while the implementation of cardiopulmonary resuscitation for patients with advanced tumors is situation-dependent. When the patient was no longer capable of making a decision and the intention of the family members was inconsistent with the patient's previously expressed preferences, 38.31% of the respondents claimed they would support the patient.

Members of oncology medical staffs have insufficient PC knowledge, and they should pay close attention to their knowledge, attitude, and behavior in relation to PC.