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Title:
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TELEMEDICALLY AUGMENTED PALLIATIVE CARE: EMPOWERNMENT FOR PATIENTS WITH ADVANCED CANCER AND THEIR FAMILY CAREGIVERS |
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Author(s):
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Romina Nemecek, Stefanie Weber, Barbara Hofer, Patrick Huber, Herbert Watzke, Michael Binder |
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ISBN:
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978-972-8939-82-3 |
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Editors:
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Piet Kommers and Pedro Isaías |
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Year:
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2013 |
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Edition:
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Single |
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Keywords:
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Palliative care, oncology, telemedicine, video conferencing, quality of life, family caregivers |
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Type:
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Short Paper |
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First Page:
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355 |
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Last Page:
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359 |
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Language:
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English |
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Cover:
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Full Contents:
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click to dowload 
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Paper Abstract:
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Patients with advanced cancer have a substantial symptom burden, which deteriorates their quality of life (QoL). Palliative care, including symptom management, psychosocial support and assistance in decision-making improves well being of patients and their family caregivers. Special services (palliative care units, hospices, mobile hospice teams) have been established to meet the increasing demand of palliative care in the community. However, these services are expensive and usually not offered in sufficient numbers. By providing new eHealthcare services, unnecessary hospital admissions and costs for the health-care system could be avoided. We want to evaluate the effects of a telepresence intervention implemented in the homes of patients with advanced cancer. For this purpose, we will develop a user-friendly telemedical system that will enable patients encountering medical problems to send a direct request to a palliative care team. This team will be accessible around the clock with the click of a button. Furthermore, a specially tailored database including up-to date important patient information, which can be fed by both the palliative care team and the patients themselves, will be developed. We hypothesize that our telemedical concept will i) increase QoL of patients and their family caregivers and ii) reduce the number of (unnecessary) hospital visits and admissions. In order to assess the effects of this intervention we will conduct a controlled feasibility study, randomly assigning 20 patients with advanced non-small cell lung cancer to receive either standard palliative care or the telemedically augmented palliative care. We will compare QoL using standardized validated questionnaires, as well as frequency and duration of hospital visits/admissions with this control group and assess user satisfaction with our telepresence sys |
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