Developing local guidelines on deprescribing in end-of-life care
- O’Neill, Trisha
- Matthews, Sam
This article has been double-blind peer reviewed
In this article…
Why deprescribing is an important process in end-of-life care
Findings from an audit of current practice in a specialist palliative care service
A summary of local guidelines developed for deprescribing in people at the end of life
Abstract
Deprescribing is the planned and supervised process of dose reduction or stopping medication that may no longer benefit a patient or may cause more harm than good, and may be particularly important in patients near the end of life. The practice is common in specialist palliative care yet it has not been studied to any great extent and there is a lack of formal guidelines. This article summarises a small audit we carried out to evaluate deprescribing practice in patients referred to the specialist palliative care team, before developing a local deprescribing guideline for patients in the last three months of life. Our aim was to improve quality of life by reducing treatment burden and adverse events, and to align care with patient goals, values and priorities.