Decision-making experiences of health professionals in withdrawing treatment for children and young people: A qualitative study

Abdin, Shanara, Heath, Gemma, Neilson, Susan, Byron-Daniel, James and Hooper, Nic 2022. Decision-making experiences of health professionals in withdrawing treatment for children and young people: A qualitative study. Child: Care, Health and Development 48 (4) , pp. 531-543. 10.1111/cch.12956

Preview

PDF - Published Version Available under License Creative Commons Attribution. Download (994kB) | Preview

Abstract

Objective To explore factors that influence professionals in deciding whether to withdraw treatment from a child and how decision making is managed amongst professionals as an individual and as a team. Study Design Semi-structured interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of health professionals working at a UK Children's Hospital, with children with life-limiting illnesses whose treatment has been withdrawn. Data were transcribed verbatim, anonymized and analysed using a thematic framework method. Results A total of 15 participants were interviewed. Five interrelated themes with associated subthemes were generated to help understand the experiences of health professionals in decision making on withdrawing a child's treatment: (1) understanding the child's best interests, (2) multidisciplinary approach, (3) external factors, (4) psychological well-being and (5) recommendations to support shared decision making. Conclusion A shared decision-making approach should be adopted to support professionals, children and their families to make decisions collectively.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Psychology
Additional Information:	This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs License
Publisher:	Wiley
ISSN:	0305-1862
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	17 January 2022
Date of Acceptance:	31 December 2021
Last Modified:	03 May 2023 16:46
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/146728

Actions (repository staff only)

Edit Item