- Brittany Shaw
- August 2026
Faculty instructor: Sharna Aaen Clark
Abstract
End-of-life medication management
Background
End of life care can be a challenging stage of life to manage for the health care professionals and the family with a loved one making that final transition. There are end-of-life medications that can utilized for patients making this final transition to be comfortable and pain free. The challenge is that in many cases, the family/loved ones may not be aware of the medications or indications for them once the patient has become non-verbal or not communicating like usual.
Purpose
The purpose of this project is to create an easy to utilize tool for families as a starting point with end-of-life medication management and open the path of discussion with healthcare providers to advocate for their loved one’s comfort at end of life. This tool can help families during this time get a general idea of medications utilized and why they’re utilized for loved ones at end-of-life.
Methods
Literature review was done to discover the barriers to medication administration at end-of-life care, medications used, as well as stakeholder interview from an experienced nurse at the inpatient hospital in the area.
Discussion
Current inpatient hospital does not have a standardized workflow or best practice in line with providing end-of-life care to families and their loved one on their final journey. The first step to address this need was to develop an easy to read in laymen’s terms a broad overview of end-of-life medication management as well as address misconceptions that may be around end-of-life medication administration. This tool can also be utilized by new nurses working in med/surg and other inpatient settings that may not have had experience with end-of-life care. To take this project further, the next step would be to develop a research presentation to present to other nurses and healthcare providers to get a workflow in place for end-of-life care and medication management in the hospital inpatient setting.
References
Gagnon, B., Downar, J., Nguyen, O., Marcoux, I., Guay, D., Marquis, M.-A., Tshibangu, R.-F. M., Boivin, J., Labeau-Caouette, M., Savin, A., & Parsons, H. A. (2026). Demographic and clinical characteristics, practices, and outcomes of continuous palliative sedation: A multi-setting, province-wide retrospective cohort study. Palliative Medicine, 40(3), 358–368. https://doi.org/10.1177/02692163251403417
Masman, A. D., van Dijk, M., Tibboel, D., Baar, F. P., & Mathôt, R. A. (2015). Medication use during end-of-life care in a palliative care centre. International journal of clinical pharmacy, 37(5), 767–775. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11096-015-0094-3
McEvoy T. (2016). Atropine: Terminal Respiratory Secretions. Hospital pharmacy, 51(1), 39–41. https://doi.org/10.1310/hpj5101-39
Ochman, P. (2017, August 24). Dispelling 5 Top Palliative Medicine Myths. Chapters Health System. https://www.chaptershealth.org/chapters-of-life-blog/palliative-medicine/dispelling-5-top-palliative-medicine-myths/
(R.Burke, personal communication, August 2, 2026)