An article in the Telegraph indicates that the Liverpool Care Pathway is not going to be abolished: In fact the new protocals could be worse for patients because doctors are going to be allowed to make the decisions regardless of whether the patient has the capacity to make their own decisions:
The discredited Liverpool Care Pathway is to be “rebranded” rather than abolished, senior doctors have said. In July ministers said the end-of-life protocals would be axed, after a damning independent review undercovered frequent and “heartbreaking” cases of patients being denied water and left desperately sucking at sponges used to moisten their mouths.
Instead, every patient would receive individual end-of-life care plans, following the review led by Baroness Julia Neuberger. However, doctors who led criticism of the pathway say new draft guidance, seen by the Daily Telegraph, outlining a replacement scheme will perpetuate many of its worst practices, allowing patients to suffer days of dehyration, or to be sedated, leaving them unable to even ask for food or drink.
Professor Pullicino points out the difficulties of making predictions about when a patient is near death:
“There is no indication about how patients who are in the last days of life are going to be diagnosed as such. There is no mention of a research base to improve this prediction. This was a main central concern of the Neuberger report,” he said. Any replacement scheme should be studied before being introduced, or risked simply repeating the same problems, he said.
“The Liverpool Care Pathway not only produced many instances of suspected hastening of death but also repeated instances of poor care.”
“The fact is that little seems to have changed, including the use of syringe drivers, anticipatory prescribing, use of sedation and narcotics and limitation of hydration and nutrition by a ‘best interest’ team decision.
Read More http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/10487109/Liverpool-Care-Pathway-being-rebranded-not-axed.html
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