What investigations and procedures do patients in hospices want? Interview based survey of patients and their nurses

Slevin et al reported that patients with cancer were much more likely to opt for chemotherapy with minimal chance of benefit than were their professional carers and people without cancer.1 They also said that attitudes changed dramatically once cancer had been diagnosed. We investigated the attitudes of terminally ill patients in our hospice towards investigations and invasive procedures and compared these with the attitudes of their nurses. Randomly selected inpatients with advanced cancer at our hospice and their key nurses took part in an interview based survey. Patients were asked about 14 procedures of increasing invasiveness. Travelling was mentioned when necessary. The questions were prefaced by: “If we thought it would help us improve your care would you want…?” Procedures ranged from having temperatures taken to having an operation, and the survey culminated in the question, “If …