Comparative Analysis of the Views of Oncologic Subspecialists and Palliative/Supportive Care Physicians Regarding Advanced Care Planning and End-of-Life Care

Abstract

Background:

Early palliative/supportive care (PSC) consultation and advance care planning (ACP) improve outcomes for patients with incurable cancer. However, PSC is underutilized in the United States.

Objective:

To examine philosophical differences among PSC, radiation oncology (RO), and medical oncology (MO) physicians in order to understand barriers to early PSC referral.

Design:

An electronic survey collected views of a nationwide cohort of health-care professionals regarding ACP and end-of-life care.

Setting/Participants/Measurements:

A subgroup analysis compared the responses from all 51 PSC, 178 RO, and 81 MO physician participants (12% response rate), using Pearson χ² and Mann-Whitney U tests for categorical and ordinal data, respectively.

Results:

More statistically significant differences were observed between RO-PSC (12 questions) and MO-PSC (12 questions) than RO-MO (4 questions). Both RO and MO were more likely than PSC physicians to believe doctors adequately care for emotional (P < .001) and physical (P < .001) needs of patients with an incurable illness. Both RO and MO were also less likely to believe that PSC physicians were helpful at addressing these needs (P = .002 and <.001, respectively) or that patients’ awareness of their life expectancy leads to better medical (P = .007 and .002, respectively) and personal (P = .001 for each) decisions. Palliative/supportive care physicians felt that doctors are generally less successful at explaining/clarifying advanced life-sustaining treatments than RO (P < .001) or MO (P = .004). MO favored later initiation of ACP than either RO (P = .006) or PSC physicians (P = .004).

Conclusions:

Differences in perception of appropriate end-of-life care exist between oncologists and PSC physicians, suggesting a need for improved education and communication between these groups.

Keywords

palliative care end-of-life care advance care planning cancer radiation oncology medical oncology

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