The pervasive relevance of COVID-19 within routine paediatric palliative care consultations during the pandemic: A conversation analytic study
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This episode features\\xa0Dr\\xa0Katie Ekberg\\xa0(School of Early Childhood and Inclusive Education,\\xa0Queensland University of Technology, Australia) and Dr\\xa0Anthony Herbert\\xa0(School of Early Childhood and\\xa0Inclusive Education, Queensland University of Technology, Australia).
The urgency of caring for children with complex and serious conditions ensures that care must continue during the\\xa0Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.
As yet, guidelines for communication with families about the COVID-19 pandemic are not based on direct observational\\xa0evidence of actual communication practices within palliative care during the pandemic.\\xa0The current study provides evidence of the pervasive relevance of communication about the COVID-19 pandemic\\xa0during clinician-family paediatric palliative care consultations.There was a pervasive relevance of serious and non-serious talk about the pandemic.
Topics typical of standard paediatric palliative care consultations often led to discussion of the pandemic, including\\xa0medical discussions and psychosocial and lifestyle discussions.Clinicians (55%) and parents (45%) initiated talk about the pandemic.
Clinicians should expect and be prepared for the pervasiveness of talk about the COVID-19 pandemic within standard\\xa0paediatric palliative care consultations, so that they can be flexible in how they respond to families.
Future guidelines should consider the pervasive and varied ways that conversations about a pandemic are raised within and across routine consultations.