heshmatolah Heydari
Lorestan University, Iran
Title: Home-based Palliative Care: A Strategy for Keeping Intensive Care Unit Beds Vacant
Biography
Biography: heshmatolah Heydari
Abstract
The increasing prevalence of chronic diseases throughout the world is an undeniable phenomenon, In fact, 13% of all deaths related to chronic diseases are caused by cancer and the majority of cancer patients expire in the intensive care units (ICU), whereas bed occupancy of ICUs is in crises. In this situation, firstly, a number of patients do not have access to the ICU beds, and secondly, because of the need to ICU beds, the admitted patients in ICU wards are discharged earlier. WHO introduced home-based palliative care to improve the quality of life, quality of care, quality of death and patient satisfaction; decrease burnout in staffing and mortality in hospitals; reduce the cost, accept end of life as live days; neither accelerate death nor prolong life; consider all dimensions of human; help the patients to be active until the time of death; help the patient’s family to cope with the disease and loss of patient; and release the beds in hospitals. Although hospital beds are considered for healing the patients not a hospice for them, the majority of cancer patients die in the hospital and on the ICU beds, and to the last moments of life, they receive specialized cure, and occupy ICU beds. Cancer patients in health system of Iran receive specific treatment and chemotherapy even to moment of death. To consider countless benefits of home care and the patients’ desire to receive services at home, if we can provide the conditions that at least 20% of end stage cancer patients in receive home based palliative care, 1000 deaths will occur at home yearly, and 1000 ICU beds will be released for use for other patients with better prognosis for survival. Therefore, health system authorities in Iran should considered home-based palliative care of cancer patients as a priority.