Experiences and attitudes of medical professionals on treatment of end-of-life patients in intensive care units in the Republic of Croatia: a cross-sectional study

Decisions about limitations of life sustaining treatments (LST) are made for end-of-life patients in intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of this research was to explore the professional and ethical attitudes and experiences of medical professionals on treatment of end-of-life patients in ICUs in th...

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Published in:BMC medical ethics 2022-02, Vol.23 (1), p.12-12, Article 12
Main Authors: Špoljar, Diana, Vučić, Marinko, Peršec, Jasminka, Merc, Vlasta, Kereš, Tatjana, Radonić, Radovan, Poljaković, Zdravka, Nesek Adam, Višnja, Karanović, Nenad, Čaljkušić, Krešimir, Župan, Željko, Grubješić, Igor, Kopić, Jasminka, Vranković, Srđan, Krobot, Renata, Nevajdić, Bojana, Golubić, Mia, Grosek, Štefan, Kujundžić Tiljak, Mirjana, Štajduhar, Andrija, Tonković, Dinko, Borovečki, Ana
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Advance directives (Medicine)
Antibiotics
Attitude of Health Personnel
Beliefs, opinions and attitudes
Croatia
Cross-Sectional Studies
Death
Decision Making
End-of-life care
End-of-life decision-making
Ethical aspects
Ethics
Female
Hospitals
Humans
Intensive care
Intensive Care Units
Internal medicine
Laws, regulations and rules
Male
Medical ethics
Nurses
Patients
Physicians
Professional ethics
Questionnaires
Response rates
Terminal care
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Summary:Decisions about limitations of life sustaining treatments (LST) are made for end-of-life patients in intensive care units (ICUs). The aim of this research was to explore the professional and ethical attitudes and experiences of medical professionals on treatment of end-of-life patients in ICUs in the Republic of Croatia. A cross-sectional study was conducted among physicians and nurses working in surgical, medical, neurological, and multidisciplinary ICUs in the total of 9 hospitals throughout Croatia using a questionnaire with closed and open type questions. Exploratory factor analysis was conducted to reduce data to a smaller set of summary variables. Mann-Whitney U test was used to analyse the differences between two groups and Kruskal-Wallis tests were used to analyse the differences between more than two groups. Less than third of participants (29.2%) stated they were included in the decision-making process, and physicians are much more included than nurses (p 
ISSN:1472-6939
1472-6939
DOI:10.1186/s12910-022-00752-5