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Record W2126086977 · doi:10.1056/nejmra1208795

Dying with Dignity in the Intensive Care Unit

2014· review· en· W2126086977 on OpenAlexaff
Graeme Rocker

Bibliographic record

VenueNew England Journal of Medicine · 2014
Typereview
Languageen
FieldMedicine
TopicPalliative Care and End-of-Life Issues
Canadian institutionsMcMaster UniversityDalhousie University
Fundersnot available
KeywordsMedicineDignityIntensive care unitIntensive care medicineMEDLINENursingUnit (ring theory)Law

Abstract

fetched live from OpenAlex

he traditional goals of intensive care are to reduce the morbidity and mortality associated with critical illness, maintain organ function, and restore health.Despite technological advances, death in the intensive care unit (ICU) remains commonplace.Death rates vary widely within and among countries and are influenced by many factors. 1 Comparative international data are lacking, but an estimated one in five deaths in the United States occurs in a critical care bed. 2 In this review, we address the concept of dignity for patients dying in the ICU.When the organ dysfunction of critical illness defies treatment, when the goals of care can no longer be met, or when life support is likely to result in outcomes that are incongruent with patients' values, ICU clinicians must ensure that patients die with dignity.The definition of "dying with dignity" recognizes the intrinsic, unconditional quality of human worth but also external qualities of physical comfort, autonomy, meaningfulness, preparedness, and interpersonal connection.3 Respect should be fostered by being mindful of the "ABCDs" of dignity-conserving care (attitudes, behaviors, compassion, and dialogue) 4 (Table 1).Preserving the dignity of patients, avoiding harm, and preventing or resolving conflict are conditions of the privilege and responsibility of caring for patients at the end of life.In our discussion of principles, evidence, and practices, we assume that there are no extant conflicts between the ICU team and the patient's family.Given the scope of this review, readers are referred elsewhere for guidance on conflict prevention and resolution in the ICU.5,6 The concept of dying with dignity in the ICU implies that although clinicians may forgo some treatments, care can be enhanced as death approaches.Fundamental to maintaining dignity is the need to understand a patient's unique perspectives on what gives life meaning in a setting replete with depersonalizing devices.The goal is caring for patients in a manner that is consistent with their values at a time of incomparable vulnerability, when they rarely can speak for themselves.7 For example, patients who value meaningful relationships may decline life-prolonging measures when such relationships are no longer possible.Conversely, patients for whom physical autonomy is not crucial may accept technological dependence if it confers a reasonable chance of an acceptable, albeit impaired, outcome.8 At issue is what each patient would be willing to undergo for a given probability of survival and anticipated quality of life. On the Need for Pa lli ati v e C a r eThe coexistence of palliative care and critical care may seem paradoxical in the technological ICU.However, contemporary critical care should be as concerned with palliation as with the prevention, diagnosis, monitoring, and treatment of lifethreatening conditions.

Fetched live from OpenAlex and de-inverted. Abstracts are not stored in this database: the inverted indexes are 8.6 GB of the frame’s 9.3 GB of text, and the host has 13 GB free.

How this classification was reachedexpand

Full frame machine prediction

Teacher imitation

Not calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. The Gemma side is a direct model label for every work in the frame, read from the title-only record. The Codex side is a classifier learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and calibrated to design-weighted sample rates; fields without enough sample support carry no Codex call. Candidate is the union of the two sides; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels.

metaresearch head score (Codex)0.002
metaresearch head score (Gemma)0.007
Version: metacan-v3-hybrid-931329e0061cValidation status: machine_predicted_unvalidated
Candidate categoriesnone
Consensus categoriesnone
DomainCandidate signal: none · Consensus signal: none
Study designCandidate signal: Not applicable · Consensus signal: none
GenreCandidate signal: Review · Consensus signal: Review
Teacher disagreement score0.003
Threshold uncertainty score0.011

Distilled classifier scores by category (both heads)

CategoryCodexGemma
Metaresearch0.0020.007
Meta-epidemiology (narrow)0.0000.000
Meta-epidemiology (broad)0.0010.000
Bibliometrics0.0010.001
Science and technology studies0.0010.002
Scholarly communication0.0030.003
Open science0.0010.002
Research integrity0.0020.002
Insufficient payload (model declined to judge)0.0020.000

Machine scores (provisional)

The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.

Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.

Opus teacher head0.236
GPT teacher head0.465
Teacher spread0.229 · how far apart the two teachers sit on this one work
Validation statusscore_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from it

Classification

machine, unvalidated

Machine predicted; a candidate call from one source (direct Gemma or distilled Codex), not a consensus.

The models applied no category: nothing in the taxonomy fit this work.
Study designNot applicable
Domainnot available
GenreReview

How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".

Quick stats

Citations330
Published2014
Admission routes1
Has abstractyes

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