In workstream 3, we worked with staff at Yorkshire hospices to develop brief interventions for the management of the challenging symptoms of pain, breathlessness, and fatigue–exhaustion, and implemented these in routine care in ways that facilitated staff to intervene more effectively.
We developed and evaluated resources to help patients cope better with their symptoms, reduce interference in daily activities, and be better able to engage with healthcare services.
We determined the impact of these resources. This included uptake and use by patients, qualitative interviews on how patients and carers used them to support their own management, and how well these resources were supported by palliative care staff in terms of promotion to patients and regular use in clinical encounters.
As part of this workstream, we asked hospice pharmacists to provide medicines optimisation consultations for patients with pain, breathlessness, or fatigue from cancer. These took the form of two telephone-delivered consultations and were based on a current NHS community pharmacy service called the New Medicine Service. The pharmacist discussed medicines with the patients, how to get the best use from them, and goals were set between the two consultations. A patient resource was also developed to use alongside the consultations.
This workstream is complete.
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