Do Healthy People Engage With Education About Death, Dying and Advance Care Planning? An Early Evaluation of the Omega Course.
Ieuan Davies, Chantal Meystre, Jeremy Dale
PMID 36270635WHAT IT FOUND
Healthy adults who took a community course about death and advance care planning reported feeling more comfortable discussing death, having more conversations, and reporting more end-of-life planning.
This small, uncontrolled evaluation cannot prove the course caused change.
Key findings
01Respondents reported significant improvement in all 4 measured domains, with preparation to plan for death increasing by 2.9/10 and comfort discussing death by 2.6/10.
02The course was rated 9.1/10 for enabling safe discussion, and comfort discussing death rose from mean 5.7 to 8.3, P < .01.
03Respondents reported practical planning actions, including discussing wishes with family, writing or updating wills, and making funeral plans.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
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What it does not show
Only 23 people completed the questionnaire, and there was no control group or comparison with people who did not take the course. The response rate was 37%, with no reminders and a 21-day window, so responders may have been more positive than non-responders. Participants were asked after the course to recall their before scores, and questionnaires were sent 3 to 27 months later, so recall bias is possible. The sample was mainly older female adults, well educated, and from an affluent area with limited ethnic diversity, so results may not transfer. The paper notes that validation of the questionnaires will be important, and results came from 1 delivery team, so reproducibility is uncertain.
Declared interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest and received no financial support for the research, authorship, or publication.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that the Omega Course causes better advance care planning or less fear of death. The study had no control group, relied on self-reported before and after answers from 23 respondents, and fear of death improved least.