Literature Review

How caregivers can prepare for a loved one’s final days AARP; by Paul Wynn; 9/28/26 When Dr. Chris Kerr’s mother was dying, he had the kind of experience that can change the way a doctor thinks about death. Kerr had spent decades caring for people at the end of life as a palliative care doctor in the Buffalo, New York, area. But when his mother, Shirley, became seriously ill, he experienced death through the lens of a son and a caregiver... “My lasting memory of my mother is her strong connection to her parents,” says Kerr, author of Death Is But a Dream and chief medical officer of Hospice and Palliative Care Buffalo. “It took me a while, but I realized that I had to stop trying to play doctor and just be there for her.”

A new way to measure nursing productivity: Total labor cost per admission HFMA - Health Operations Management; by Sylvain Trepanier, DNP, RN, CENP and Cynthia Salisbury, MSN, RN, NEA-BC; 9/25/26An innovative model for measuring nurse productivity better accounts for patients’ care needs and the team-based nature of nursing care. ... Leaders at Providence [a large regional health system based in Renton, Washington] decided it was important to create space for nurses to define for themselves how to deliver care most effectively in the acute care setting. Nurses were invited to deconstruct their current role and create a new model of care based on the needs of their patients, with an appropriate distribution of patient care across a collaborative team.

Assessing palliative care screening tools for patients with cancer Oncology Nurse; by Vicki Moore, PhD; 9/25/26 A total of 19 screening tools for assessing palliative care needs among patients with cancer were identified in a recent scoping review, but with variation in their applications. The findings of the review were reported in the journal BMJ Supportive & Palliative Care. ... The researchers identified 37 studies that reported a total of 19 screening tools for assessing palliative care needs of patients with cancer, which the researchers grouped into 3 categories. These included universal tools, tools with cancer-specific modules, and tools specifically developed for patients with cancer. 

At the bedside: clinician grief Core IM; podcast by Dr. Margot Hedlin, Dr. Danai Papadatou, Dr. Tamar Schiff and Dr. Jafar Al-Mondhiry; 9/8/26... "I can’t share his name, but I can tell you what he taught me about grief. I met this patient a few months after graduating from medical school, and by that point he was already dying. ... I grieved for this man the way I’ve grieved for many patients: I found a supply closet to cry in for a few minutes before my pager went off. But in the years since, years in which I worked at the epicenter of the COVID pandemic, worked nights at a cancer hospital, and suffered personal loss, I’ve found that grief is too large to be stuffed in a supply closet: when left unaddressed, it keeps coming back, in ways and places that I couldn’t predict."

Beyond the book: How stories help shape future physicians University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV); by Doug Criss; 9/22/26 Katie Houk builds a medical humanities collection that gives students at the Kirk Kerkorian School of Medicine space to reflect, create, and better understand the people they will care for. ... “Medical humanities is the integration of the humanistic fields into medical training,” Houk says. A large part of the work involves narrative medicine: reading and discussing fictional or true stories to build empathy for patients, connect physicians with one another, and encourage reflection on the physician-patient relationship and the profession itself.

Palliative care conversations can enhance support for patients with advanced cancer Oncology Nurse Advisor; by Megan Garlapow, PhD; 9/22/26 Palliative care and hospice address different points along the trajectory of serious illness, and clinicians can improve patient and family understanding by clearly distinguishing the 2 services and using direct, supportive language, according to a presentation at ONS Bridge 2026 by Meg Krasne, MD, MPH, clinical expert and instructor at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and Harvard Medical School. ... She described palliative care as a specialized medical discipline centered on symptom management, coping, and medical decision-making. Rather than representing a transition away from active treatment, palliative care can function as an additional layer of support throughout the course of serious illness. 

Palliative and psycho-oncology care: Dr. Ramy Sedhom on patient distress signs Oncology Nursing News; by Alex Biese; 9/21/26Ramy Sedhom, MD, of Penn Medicine Princeton Health discusses blending palliative care with psycho-oncology to treat patient distress in oncology care. ... In this Q&A with Oncology Nursing News, Sedhom discusses strategies for bridging historical silos between palliative care and psycho-oncology, debunks persistent misconceptions surrounding supportive interventions in curative settings, and identifies clinical red flags for unseen distress. 

Top ten tips palliative care clinicians should know when caring for seriously ill patients with stimulant use disordersJournal of Palliative Medicine; by Rebekka DePew, Nicole Dussault, Kyle Quirk, Erin Vipler, Josh Borris, Sandra DiScala, Teddy Scheel, Katrina Nickels, Gregg Robbins-Welty, Janet Ho; 8/26Stimulant use disorder (StUD) is common in the hospice and palliative care (PC) setting, though guidance for clinicians remains limited. Stigma around stimulant use is widespread and can lead to impaired clinician/patient communication, poor symptom control, and lower quality of care. PC clinicians should be able to diagnose StUD, understand the potential pharmacologic and nonpharmacologic management options, engage with patients in a trauma-informed way, and refer to addiction medicine colleagues when appropriate. When utilizing opioids for pain management, PC clinicians should be aware of the impact of stimulant use on opioid risk and toxicity. In this article, a multidisciplinary group of PC, hospice, addiction medicine, psychiatry, ethics, and pharmacy clinicians presents ten practical tips for caring for seriously ill patients with current or prior StUD.

59% of health care workers say they will look for a new job in the next year, and employers guess 39% Physicians Practice; by Austin Littrell; 9/16/26 The 2026 Healthcare Workforce Barometer measures the gap between what practice leaders think their staff want, and what staff say they want. Fifty-nine percent of U.S. health care workers say they are likely to look for job openings, interview for or switch to a new role in the next year, according to the 2026 Healthcare Workforce Barometer released Wednesday by The Harris Poll. Employers surveyed alongside them estimated that 39% of their own staff would. Forty-two percent of employees said they are likely to look outside their organization; employers put it at 32%. ... Roughly 40% of the employee sample are physicians, nurses, nurse practitioners or physician assistants; approximately 60% work in other patient-facing roles.

Hospice families and Mercy patients navigate overlapping Allina strikes as health system reports 37 doctors crossed picket linesMedical Daily, Minneapolis, MN; by Elena Vega; 9/16/26Allina Health says only about half of the nearly 150 physicians represented by Doctors Council SEIU walked off the job when a four-day strike began Monday, Sept. 14, at Mercy Hospital's Coon Rapids campus and Unity campus in Fridley. Allina spokesperson Blois Olson told the Minnesota Reformer that 37 union doctors crossed the picket line and 40 were not scheduled to work this week. ... As of Wednesday, Sept. 16, MedicalDaily had not found a newer official count or a public response from the union. The physician strike is running alongside a separate seven-day walkout by roughly 60 Allina hospice nurses that began Friday, Sept. 11, and is scheduled to run through Thursday, Sept. 17.

How nurses fit into the modern healthcare team World Business Outlook; blog; 9/15/26 Care is rarely delivered by one expert acting alone. It is built through constant coordination, quick decisions, and a steady flow of information between professionals. In that shared space, nurses often become the people who connect everyone else.