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starfish palliative care
Over the past 5 years, a palliative care training programme has been developing at San Lazaro Infectious Diseases Hospital, Manila, Republic of the Philippines with the help of a consultative team from Australia and New Zealand.
Early in the programme, the terrible plight of rabies patients dying with uncontrolled delirium was identified as a priority need for applying palliative care principles. There is virtually nothing in the literature on the management of dying rabies patients, especially in the context of non-industrialised countries.
A management plan was initiated to establish a more effective medication regimen to control the delirium suffered. A study was devised in an attempt to document the symptoms and signs of dying rabies patients, and the effect of the new medication regimen.
Many difficulties were encountered in attempting to change practice and in achieving consistency of medication supply. However, eventually, the results of observing 45 patients admitted to San Lazaro Hospital consecutively with a diagnosis of rabies were collected and are reported here. The study recorded the commonest symptoms of rabies patients seen at San Lazaro Hospital and demonstrated the effectiveness of applying basic symptom control principles on reducing their suffering.
ÜDownload the study:
Rabies: a significant palliative care issue
Sue C. Marsden, Ceri R. Cabanban