What are the problem and purpose of the research article?
Yoong et al. (2013) in their research sought to explore the importance of integration palliative care within standard oncologic care for patients with advanced lung cancer. Palliative care has over the years been associated with hospice care and inpatient care while outpatient care has not had a system that can accommodate palliative care for patients with such illnesses. Patients with chronic and sever illnesses have to be incorporated in a system that affords them both curative and palliative care because for them it not just about healing and recovery but also a need to live a quality life even within the existing limitations. At a time when the palliative care has been associated with end-of-life care, it is important to cut off this notion and redefine palliative care as a systematic and professional way of affording patients a platform to improve their self-efficacy (Greer, Jackson, Meier & Temel, 2013).
What are the hypotheses or research questions/objectives of the study?
The study was based on the primary objective of determining the importance of palliative care within ambulatory care settings but this was based on developing appropriate understanding of the different elements of palliative care. In this regard, the three objectives that were seen to drive the research included; to explore and establish the key elements and content of early palliative care; to establish how these elements and content vary with time and to make a comparison of the elements and contents of palliative care and oncologic care at various critical points within the clinical process (Yoong et al., 2013).
Is this a quantitative or qualitative research article?
The research was conducted within the concepts of qualitative data analysis of a randomized-controlled trial with specific consideration of the variables of the quality of life, the mood and the survival of patients who have been newly diagnosed with metastatic non-small-cell lung cancer. These variables would then be correlated with the specific study objectives as identified (Tappen, 2011).
What population was sampled?
The sample population included all patients within an oncologic clinic in Massachusetts General Hospital within Boston who had been newly diagnosed with metastatic non-small-cell lung cancer. This implies that all patients in this sample had early stage lung cancer that had only been diagnosed in recent days. The eligible participants were all within the initial eight weeks of diagnosis and had a performance score/status of 0-2 on the Eastern Cooperative Oncology Group. The participants were also expected to indicate an ability to answer questionnaires sufficiently in English (Maloney, 2012).
Sample population, method and criteria
The researchers utilized a random sampling technique to group the participants into the intervention and control groups. The intervention group has a total of n=77 participant who received palliative care integrated into standard oncologic while the control group (n=74) received standard oncologic care only. The intervention group was then subjected to further stratified sampling in which the n=77 participants were grouped into four cases on the criteria of survival times of not more than 3 months; 3-to-6 months; 6-to-12 months and the fourth group 12-to-24 months. Within these four groups, the researchers further initiated random selection of five participants from each sub-group so that the actual intervention sample had twenty (n=20) participants that would facilitate thematic saturation.
What steps were taken to protect human research subjects?
The researchers did not seek informed consent of the participants and this implies that the enrollment was done based on the assumption that if the participant did not indicate any reservations about the intended enrollment, then there was implied consent (Maloney, 2012). There is no indication that an Institutional Review Board or ethics committee was informed of the study and this leaving the assumption that the Massachusetts General Hospital had prior knowledge of the study and probably did not object (Melnyk & Fineout-Overholt, 2015).
References
Emanuel, E. J., & Menikoff, J. (2011). Reforming the regulations governing research with human subjects. New England Journal of Medicine, 365(12), 1145-1150.
Greer, J. A., Jackson, V. A., Meier, D. E., & Temel, J. S. (2013). Early integration of palliative care services with standard oncology care for patients with advanced cancer. CA: a cancer journal for clinicians, 63(5), 349-363.
Maloney, D. M. (2012). Protection of human research subjects: A practical guide to federal laws and regulations. Springer Science & Business Media.
Melnyk, B. M., & Fineout-Overholt, E. (2015). Evidence-based practice in nursing and healthcare: A guide to best practice (3rd ed.). Philadelphia, PA: Wolters Kluwer Health/Lippincott Williams & Wilkins. My work setting: Hospice
Tappen, R. M. (2011). Advanced nursing research: From theory to practice. Sudbury, MA: Jones & Bartlett Learning.
Yoong, J., Park, E. R., Greer, J. A., Jackson, V. A., Gallagher, E. R., Pirl, W. F., & Temel, J. S. (2013). Early palliative care in advanced lung cancer: a qualitative study. JAMA internal medicine, 173(4), 283-290.
