Quality of Life Factors in Geriatric Medicine Decisions. Executive Summary

摘要

The study's purpose was to explore the perceptions of elderly patients, their spouses and their physicians regarding patient quality of life (QL) and its role in resuscitation decisions. Another objective was to assess physician and spouse ability to provide substituted judgments for resuscitation on the event patients were unable to communicate their preferences. Findings suggest that physicians have a limited understanding of patient QL, spouses' perceptions of patient QL approximate those of the patients, physicians and spouses have difficulty predicting patient resuscitation preferences, and physician difficulties in predicting patient resuscitation preferences may be due to their perceptions of impaired patient QL.