Department of Health Policy and Management, Gillings School of Global Public Health, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, North Carolina, USA.
Brookdale Department of Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, New York, New York, USA.
J Pain Symptom Manage. 2020 Jul;60(1):e66-e69. doi: 10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2020.04.006. Epub 2020 Apr 10.
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic presents unique challenges to those who work with the seriously ill population, including both health care providers and the family caregivers providing unpaid care. We rely on this lay workforce as health care routinely transitions care to the home, and now more than ever, we are depending on them in the current pandemic. As palliative care and other health care providers become overwhelmed with patients critically ill with COVID-19, and routine care becomes delayed, we have a charge to recognize and work with family caregivers. Our commentary provides rationale for the need to focus on family caregivers and key considerations for how to include them in pandemic clinical decision making.
2019 年冠状病毒病(COVID-19)大流行给治疗重症患者的人群带来了独特的挑战,包括医疗保健提供者和提供无偿护理的家庭照顾者。当医疗保健常规性地将护理转移到家庭时,我们依赖于这些非专业人员,而在当前的大流行中,我们比以往任何时候都更依赖他们。随着姑息治疗和其他医疗保健提供者因 COVID-19 重症患者而不堪重负,常规护理被延迟,我们有责任认识并与家庭照顾者合作。我们的评论为关注家庭照顾者提供了理由,并就如何将他们纳入大流行临床决策提出了关键考虑因素。