Palliative care aims to provide holistic care for individuals with health-related suffering due to severe illness to improve the quality of life of patients, their families and caregivers, particularly at the end of life. However, as oncology treatments continue to advance, more people are living longer with and beyond cancer and this group of “cancer survivors” is becoming larger and more complex, so the potential role of Specialist Palliative Care (SPC) in supporting their needs is being questioned.
The PRiSM project aims to create a consensus opinion among European experts (palliative care professionals, oncology professionals and non-professional experts) about the core functions of SPC, use of the term “cancer survivors”, categories of individuals with cancer or a history of cancer, and the extended role of SPC for individuals with a history of cancer. The results will be used to inform development of a model for the role of palliative care within cancer survivorship.
Although there have been a number of previous core outcome set studies in palliative care, these have usually related to end-of-life scenarios and do not account for those “living beyond cancer”. Additionally, the core needs of “cancer survivors” may not align to SPC services, so further exploration is required.
Chief Investigator / Supervisor - Professor Andrew Davies, Professor of Palliative Medicine, Trinity College Dublin / University College Dublin / Our Lady’s Hospice & Care Services Dublin (Ireland)
Lead researcher - Dr Amy Taylor, Specialty Trainee Palliative Medicine / Clinical Research Fellow, Trinity College Dublin / Our Lady’s Hospice & Care Services Dublin (Ireland)
Disease Category: Cancer
Disease Name: Cancer
Age Range: 18 - 85
Sex:
Nature of Intervention: Palliative
- Clinical experts
- Patient/ support group representatives
- Researchers
- Service providers
- COS (Other)
- Delphi process
- Literature review
This study will seek consensus ‘expert’ opinion via an e-Delphi study. Purposeful sampling will be used to identify the expert population. The process will be conducted in accordance with the Conducting and REporting DElphi Studies guideline for Palliative Care.