Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death

Richard Mularski; J. Randall Curtis; Molly Osborne; Ruth A. Engelberg; Linda Ganzini

doi:10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008

Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death

Richard Mularski, J. Randall Curtis, Molly Osborne, Ruth A. Engelberg, Linda Ganzini

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

56 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

Improving end-of-life care requires accurate indicators of the quality of dying. The purpose of this study was to measure the agreement among family members who rate a loved one's dying experience. We administered the Quality of Dying and Death instrument to 94 family members of 38 patients who died in the intensive care unit. We measured a quality of dying score of 60 out of 100 points and found moderate agreement among family members as measured by an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) of 0.44. Variability on individual items ranged from an ICC of 0.15 to 1.0. Families demonstrated more agreement on frequencies of events (ICC 0.54) than on determinations of quality (ICC 0.32). These findings reveal important variability among family raters and suggest that until the variability is understood, multiple raters may generate more comprehensive end-of-life data and may more accurately reflect the quality of dying and death.

Original language	English (US)
Pages (from-to)	306-315
Number of pages	10
Journal	Journal of Pain and Symptom Management
Volume	28
Issue number	4
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008
State	Published - Oct 2004
Externally published	Yes

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Terminal Care

Intensive Care Units

Keywords

attitude to death
Death
end-of-life care
family
outcome assessment
proxy
quality indicators health care
quality of dying
quality of health care
terminal care

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine
Clinical Neurology
Neurology
Nursing(all)

Cite this

Mularski, R., Curtis, J. R., Osborne, M., Engelberg, R. A., & Ganzini, L. (2004). Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, 28(4), 306-315. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008

Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death. / Mularski, Richard; Curtis, J. Randall; Osborne, Molly; Engelberg, Ruth A.; Ganzini, Linda.

In: Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, Vol. 28, No. 4, 10.2004, p. 306-315.

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

Mularski, R, Curtis, JR, Osborne, M, Engelberg, RA & Ganzini, L 2004, 'Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death', Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, vol. 28, no. 4, pp. 306-315. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008

Mularski R, Curtis JR, Osborne M, Engelberg RA, Ganzini L. Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death. Journal of Pain and Symptom Management. 2004 Oct;28(4):306-315. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008

Mularski, Richard ; Curtis, J. Randall ; Osborne, Molly ; Engelberg, Ruth A. ; Ganzini, Linda. / Agreement among family members in their assessment of the quality of dying and death. In: Journal of Pain and Symptom Management. 2004 ; Vol. 28, No. 4. pp. 306-315.

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Access to Document

10.1016/j.jpainsymman.2004.01.008