[A Multifaceted Strategy to Improve the Hospice Care Completeness of Intensive Care Nurses]

In recent years, awareness of the need to facilitate death with dignity has advanced significantly in Taiwan. Critically ill patients admitted to intensive care units (ICUs) often endure the pain of medical interventions. Therefore, providing comprehensive end-of-life care that respects patient dignity is crucial. A situational analysis revealed that the ICUs in our hospital lacked standardized care procedures, that ICU staff were unclear about the role of the palliative care team, and that related educational training was deficient. Further investigation showed the completeness rate of ICU nurse implementation of end-of-life care to be 46.3%.

This project was developed and executed to increase the end-of-life care completeness rate to 85.0%.

Establish end-of-life care standard operating procedures; design a small portable reminder card featuring the slogan "Physical, Mental, and Spiritual Care" to help prompt nurses while on duty; and plan educational training and cross-team workshops that utilize a simple tabletop game to support course teaching and increase engagement and interactivity.

Result: After full project implementation, the rate of end-of-life care completion was 88.4%.

The developed project effectively improved the integrity of end-of-life care provided by ICU nurses, alleviating the suffering of terminally ill patients and enhancing their dignity. The project also helped families face the grieving process with greater composure, improving the overall quality of end-of-life care provided in our ICUs.