Recommendations on palliative care aspects in intensive care medicine

Abstract

Background: The timely integration of palliative care is important for patients suffering from various advanced diseases with limited prognosis. While a German S-3-guideline on palliative care exists for patients with incurable cancer, a recommendation for non-oncological patients and especially for integration of palliative care into intensive care medicine is missing to date.

Method: Ten German medical societies worked on recommendations on palliative care aspects in intensive care in a consensus process from 2018 to 2023.

Results: Based on the german consensus paper, the palliative care aspects of the respective medical disciplines concerning intensive care are addressed. The recommendations partly refer to general situations, but also to specific aspects or diseases, such as geriatric issues, heart or lung diseases, encephalopathies and delirium, terminal renal diseases, oncological diseases and palliative emergencies in intensive care medicine. Measures such as non-invasive ventilation for symptom control and compassionate weaning are also included.

Conclusion: The timely integration of palliative care into intensive care medicine aims to improve quality of life and symptom control and also takes into acccount the often urgently needed support for patients' highly stressed relatives.

Keywords: Early integration; Intensive care; Palliative care; Palliative medicine; Quality of life; Timely integration.