Palliative Home Care Based on Clinically Relevant Scientific Measures: A Cross-Sectional Study

Introduction: Measuring palliative care needs of patients with multiple complex illnesses and their family, is essential for providing quality clinical care. The integrated palliative care outcome scale (IPOS) is a scientifically verified measure of patients' physical, emotional symptoms, and their palliative care communication and practical needs. The patients in this study require palliative care due to both their end-of-life heart failure (HF) and vascular dementia. Purpose: The purposes are to describe and compare home palliative care needs measured by the family caregivers (N = 20) and patients (N = 20) IPOS scores and to examine whether the patient IPOS total score can predict patient HF health status and caregiving burden scores. Methods: This study uses explanatory research design with rigorous methods for obtaining information from multiple sources. Descriptive, Cohen's Kappa (k) statistics comparing patient and caregiver IPOS scores and regression analyses to examine the patient IPOS scores impact on patient HF health status and caregiving burden scores were used. Results: There was significant agreement between patient and caregiver ratings on 16 out of 17 IPOS items (k = .34 to .80). Regression analyses found that the patient IPOS total score significantly predicted patients' HF health status (β = -.50, P < .05), and caregiving burden scores (β = .57, P < .01). Conclusion: Patients' and their caregivers' IPOS scores agreement indicates palliative care needs can be consistently identified. The patient IPOS total scores can predict patients' HF health status and caregiving burden. These measures provide information directly applicable for health professionals guiding palliative home care.