Background. The physical signs of impending death have not been well characterized in cancer patients. A better understanding of these signs may improve the ability of clinicians to diagnose impending death. We examined the frequency and onset of 10 bedside physical signs and their diagnostic performance for impending death. Methods. We systematically documented 10 physical signs every 12 hours from admission to death or discharge in 357 consecutive patients with advanced cancer admitted to two acute palliative care units. We examined the frequency and median onset of each sign from death backward and calculated their likelihood ratios (LRs) associated with death within 3 days. Results. In total, 203 of 357 patients (52 of 151 in the U.S., 151 of 206 in Brazil) died. Decreased level of consciousness, Palliative Performance Scale #20%, and dysphagia of liquids appeared at high frequency and .3 days before death and had

Background The Edmonton Symptom Assessment Scale (ESAS) is widely used for symptom assessment in the clinical and research settings. We used the sensitivity-specificity approach to identify the minimal clinically important difference (MCID) for improvement and deterioration for each of the 10 ESAS symptoms. Methods This multicenter, prospective, longitudinal study enrolled advanced cancer patients. ESAS was measured at first clinic visit and a second visit 3 weeks later. For each symptom, we assessed Patient's Global Impression (“better”, “about the same”, or “worse”) at the second visit as the external criterion, and determined the MCID based on the optimal cutoff in receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) curve. We conducted sensitivity analysis by estimating MCIDs using other approaches. Results Among the 796 participants, the median duration between the 2 study visits was 21 days (interquartile range 18-28 days). The area under the ROC curve varied between 0.70-0.87, suggesting good responsiveness. For all 10 symptoms, the optimal cutoff was ≥1 point for improvement and ≤−1 point for deterioration, with sensitivities of 59%-85% and specificities of 69%-85%. Using other approaches, the MCIDs varied between 0.8 and 2.2 for improvement and between −0.8 and −2.3 for deterioration in within-patient analysis, between 1.2 and 1.6 with the ½ standard deviation approach, and between 1.3 and 1.7 with the standard error of measurement approach. Conclusions ESAS was responsive to change. The optimal cutoffs were ≥1 point for improvement and ≤−1 point for deterioration for each of the 10 symptoms. Our findings have implications for sample size calculations and response determination.

ObjectiveTo evaluate the prevalence and possible factors associated with the development of burnout among medical students in the first years of undergraduate school.MethodA cross-sectional study was conducted at the Barretos School of Health Sciences, Dr. Paulo Prata. A total of 330 students in the first four years of medical undergraduate school were invited to participate in responding to the sociodemographic and Maslach Burnout Inventory-Student Survey (MBI-SS) questionnaires. The first-year group consisted of 150 students, followed by the second-, third-, and fourth-year groups, with 60 students each.ResultsData from 265 students who answered at least the sociodemographic questionnaire and the MBI-SS were analyzed (response rate = 80.3%). One (n = 1, 0.3%) potential participant viewed the Informed Consent Form but did not agree to participate in the study. A total of 187 students (187/265, 70.6%) presented high levels of emotional exhaustion, 140 (140/265, 52.8%) had high cynicism, and 129 (129/265, 48.7%) had low academic efficacy. The two-dimensional criterion indicated that 119 (44.9%) students experienced burnout. Based on the three-dimensional criterion, 70 students (26.4%) presented with burnout. The year with the highest frequency of affected students for both criteria was the first year (p = 0.001). Personal attributes were able to explain 11% (ΔR = 0.11) of the variability of burnout under the two-dimensional criterion and 14.4% (R2 = 0.144) under the three-dimensional criterion.ConclusionThis study showed a high prevalence of burnout among medical students in a private school using active teaching methodologies. In the first years of graduation, students’ personal attributes (optimism and self-perception of health) and school attributes (motivation and routine of the exhaustive study) were associated with higher levels of burnout. These findings reinforce the need to establish preventive measures focused on the personal attributes of first-year students, providing better performance, motivation, optimism, and empathy in the subsequent stages of the course.

OBJECTIVE:The aim of this study was to evaluate some features of article titles from open access journals and to assess the possible impact of these titles on predicting the number of article views and citations.METHODS:Research articles (n = 423, published in October 2008) from all Public Library of Science (PLoS) journals and from 12 Biomed Central (BMC) journals were evaluated. Publication metrics (views and citations) were analyzed in December 2011. The titles were classified according to their contents, namely methods-describing titles and results-describing titles. The number of title characters, title typology, the use of a question mark, reference to a specific geographical region, and the use of a colon or a hyphen separating different ideas within a sentence were analyzed to identify predictors of views and citations. A logistic regression model was used to identify independent title characteristics that could predict citation rates.RESULTS:Short-titled articles had higher viewing and citation rates than those with longer titles. Titles containing a question mark, containing a reference to a specific geographical region, and that used a colon or a hyphen were associated with a lower number of citations. Articles with results-describing titles were cited more often than those with methods-describing titles. After multivariate analysis, only a low number of characters and title typology remained as predictors of the number of citations.CONCLUSIONS:Some features of article titles can help predict the number of article views and citation counts. Short titles presenting results or conclusions were independently associated with higher citation counts. The findings presented here could be used by authors, reviewers, and editors to maximize the impact of articles in the scientific community.

The objective of this review is to provide an update on prognostication in patients with advanced cancer, and to discuss future directions for research in this field. Accurate prognostication of survival for patients with advanced cancer is vital, as patient life expectancy informs many important personal and clinical decisions. The most common prognostic approach is clinician prediction of survival (CPS) using temporal, surprise, or probabilistic questions. The surprise and probabilistic questions may be more accurate than the temporal approach, partly by limiting the time frame of prediction. Prognostic models such as the Glasgow Prognostic Score (GPS), Palliative Performance Scale (PPS), Palliative Prognostic Score (PaP), Palliative Prognostic Index (PPI), or Prognosis in Palliative Care Study (PiPS) predictor model may augment CPS. However, care must be taken to select the appropriate tool since prognostic accuracy varies by patient population, setting, and time frame of prediction. In addition to life expectancy, patients and caregivers often desire that expected treatment outcomes and bodily changes be communicated to them in a sensible manner at an appropriate time. We propose the following 10 major themes for future prognostication research: 1) enhancing prognostic accuracy; 2) improving reliability and reproducibility of prognosis; 3) identifying the appropriate prognostic tool for a given setting; 4) predicting the risks and benefits of cancer therapies; 5) predicting survival for pediatric