ArticleBMJ open2022
End-of-life care in cancer patients: how much drug therapy and how much palliative care? Record linkage study in Northern Italy.
Article in BMJ open, 2022. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 10 papers.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
10 citing papers in PubMed, 12 citations in OpenAlex.
- PALLiative care in ONcology (PALLiON): A cluster-randomised trial investigating the effect of palliative care on the use of anticancer treatment at the end of life.Palliative medicine · 2024Trial
- Socioeconomic differences in the intensity of end-of-life care among patients with cancer: a population-based study in the Lazio region, Italy.European journal of public health · 2026Observational
- Systemic anticancer therapy at the end of life: real-world insights from a tertiary oncology center in Israel.The oncologist · 2025Article
- Anticancer therapy at end-of-life: A retrospective cohort study.Acta oncologica (Stockholm, Sweden) · 2024Article
- Scoping Review of International Experience of a Dedicated Fund to Support Patient Access to Cancer Drugs: Policy Implications for Thailand.International journal of health policy and management · 2024Article
- Systemic Anticancer Treatment Near the End of Life: a Narrative Literature Review.Current treatment options in oncology · 2023Review
- Pattern of care of brain tumor patients in the last months of life: analysis of a cohort of 3045 patients in the last 10 years.Neurological sciences : official journal of the Italian Neurological Society and of the Italian Society of Clinical Neurophysiology · 2023Article
- Cancer mortality in Common Mental Disorders: A 10-year retrospective cohort study.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2023Article
- Simultaneous care in oncology: Assessment of benefit in relation to symptoms, sex, and age in 753 patients.Frontiers in oncology · 2022Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
4 authors at 1 institution in 1 country.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
objectivesInvestigating end-of-life use of anticancer drugs and of palliative care services.
designPopulation based cohort linked to mortality registry and administrative databases.
settingEmilia-Romagna Region (Northern Italy).
participants55 625 residents who died of cancer between 2017 and 2020. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: Multivariate analyses were carried out to assess the relationship between cancer drug therapy and palliative care services, and their association with factors related to tumour severity.
resultsIn the last month of life, 15.3% of study population received anticancer drugs (from 12.5% to 16.9% across the eight Local Health Authorities-LHA) and 40.2% received palliative care services (from 36.2% to 43.7%). Drug therapy was inversely associated with receiving palliative care services within the last 30 days (OR 0.92, 95% CI 0.87 to 0.97), surgery within the last 6 months (OR 0.59, 95% CI 0.52 to 0.67), aggressive tumours (OR 0.88, 95% CI 0.84 to 0.93) and increasing age (OR 0.95, 95% CI 0.95 to 0.95). Drug therapy was more likely among those with haematologic tumours (OR 2.15, 95% CI 2.00 to 2.30) and in case of hospital admissions within the last 6 months (OR 1.63, 95% CI 1.55 to 1.72). Palliative care was less likely among those with haematologic compared with other tumours (OR 0.52, 95% CI 0.49 to 0.56), in case of surgery (OR 0.44, 95% CI 0.39 to 0.49) or hospital admissions (OR 0.70, 95% CI 0.67 to 0.72) within the last 6 months, if receiving anticancer drugs during the last 30 days (OR 0.90, 95% CI 0.85 to 0.94) and for each year of increasing age (OR 0.99, 95% CI 0.99 to 0.99). Palliative care was more likely in the presence of aggressive tumours (OR 1.12, 95% CI 1.08 to 1.16).
conclusionUse of anticancer drugs and palliative care in the last month of life were inversely associated, showing variability across different LHAs. While administrative data have limits, our findings are in line with conclusions of other studies.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.