Regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care: An initial survey

Purpose. - Approach the ways of acculturation of palliative care in nursing and medical teams by the regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care, identify their activities in supporting children and their families, describe their intervention sites, as well as highlight the problems encountered by professionals in these teams. Methods. - National retrospective study, conducted in 2015 among all the 22 regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care by self-administered questionnaire, in partnership with the Federation of regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care. Results. - Fifteen questionnaires were usable (68% response rate). The regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care are small, with a mean of 2.7 FTEs based on 5.1 different professionals, with a majority on part-time work. In 2014, 51% of all interventions were performed in collaboration with the hospital-based reference team of the child. Fifty-two percent of their activity concerned children with neurological diseases or multiple disabilities. The paediatric team's acculturation to the palliative care approach and the management of the sick child and his proxies occupied more than half of the working time (37% and 30%, respectively). The training of adult palliative care teams to the particular paediatric palliative care aspects corresponds to 11% of the overall activity of regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care. More than 20% of overall activity concerned training programs and research projects. Their in-hospitals activity, most often occurred in oncohaematology and least often in palliative care units and maternity. Nearly three quarters of all regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care considered to have few solicitation by sanitary and medico-social structures. Conclusion. - Regional resources teams of paediatric palliative care have a cross-regional activity with interhospital and city hospital activity, including medicosocial care structures. (C) 2016 Elsevier Masson SAS. All rights reserved.