ArticleBMC palliative care2025
Frequency and predictors of palliative sedation among patients with cancer who died in a specialist inpatient palliative care unit: a retrospective study.
Article in BMC palliative care, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 1 paper.
What it found
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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.
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Who cites it
1 citing paper in PubMed.
- Continuous sedation in adolescent and young adult cancer patients under home-based end-of-life care.Supportive care in cancer : official journal of the Multinational Association of Supportive Care in Cancer · 2026Observational
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Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundPalliative sedation (PS) is a therapeutic measure used in end-of-life care to alleviate the suffering caused by refractory symptoms. The objectives of our study were to determine the frequency of PS in a specialized inpatient acute palliative care unit (APCU), describe the characteristics of patients who received PS, compare patients who required PS with those who did not, and compare patients who received a single medication for PS with those who received multiple medications.
methodsThis was a retrospective study of 444 patients with cancer who died in a specialized inpatient APCU of a tertiary public hospital.
resultsA total of 167 patients received PS (38%). The most frequent indication was delirium (64%). The mean duration of PS was 49 h. Patients who received PS were significantly younger (p = 0.001), had higher anxiety (p = 0.024), had longer hospital admissions (p = 0.001), were more likely to have a spouse as their primary caregiver (p = 0.003), were more aware of their prognosis (p = 0.024), and had more advance directives (p = 0,001) than those who did not receive PS. Forty-six patients (28%) required two or three drugs for PS. They had a longer PS (p = 0.002) and received more parental hydration (p = 0.015) than did those who received one drug. Patients receiving midazolam as first-line treatment were less likely to receive a second drug (p = 0.003).
conclusionsA total of 38% of patients with cancer receiving specialized palliative care required PS before death. Patients who received PS were younger, had a longer hospital stay, were more likely to have their spouse be their primary caregiver, were better informed and had more advance directives. 28% of sedated patients required more than one drug, which was associated with a longer PS, the maintenance of parental hydration during PS and the initiation of PS with levomepromazine instead of midazolam.
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