Research into COVID-19 to improve palliative care | Latest news

Researchers from NUH are among a number of teams around the UK taking part in the CovPall study, an observational study looking at palliative care during a pandemic.  

CovPall is a new project trying to understand more about how palliative care services and hospices are responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. The research is looking at how COVID-19 is affecting services and the problems patients receiving palliative care, and their families, are facing and how best to respond.

Research teams like the one in Nottingham (pictured) are reporting back data to the Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care based at Kings College London, a leading national centre of excellence on palliative care which helps set the agenda concerning this sensitive area of medicine.

The results will be used to identify the challenges in treating terminally ill patients. It will also look at the challenges regarding equipment used in palliative care such as syringe drivers, which deliver a constant feed of drugs including pain-killers to patients.

Clinical research nurse Sarah Schofield, one of the three-strong research team based at Hayward House who are managing the CovPall study at NUH, said:

“Symptom management in palliative care is currently based on adapting best practice in other end of life conditions to COVID-19 patients.  There is currently very limited evidence about the symptoms experienced in patients with COVID-19 who are very ill or dying.”

The CovPall study will drive insight into how palliative care can best contribute to the delivery of healthcare during COVID-19.

Sarah is working with colleagues Cathann Manderson, who is also a clinical research nurse, and Dr Andrew Wilcock, principal investigator for the study at NUH and a Reader in palliative medicine and medical oncology at the University of Nottingham.

Data are being collected from patients with COVID-19 who are referred to the palliative care teams at NUH.

Daily assessments are conducted into patients’ status and vital functions, to monitor their overall care. Research nurses will also assess which level of COVID-19 infection they are experiencing.

Data is being collected anonymously and, to date, the team has submitted complete data on 22 patients since the start of the study on June 15.

Sarah and Cathann have both worked as palliative care specialist nurses on the wards, experience which has given them great insight into assessing patients’ symptoms.

“Such information (from the study) is vital and urgently needed to enable better planning and to anticipate clinical management, especially as the numbers of people needing palliative care are expected to increase,” added Sarah.

Information and advice on palliative care services at NUH is available online.