Therapeutic futility in cancer patients at the time of palliative care transition: An analysis with a modified version of the Medication Appropriateness Index

Background: Palliative Care professionals are often confronted with therapeutic futility, consisting in inappropriate strategies that do not add any advantage to the patient and may actually increase adverse events. Scientific literature concerning this issue is lacking. This article is one of the first to study therapeutic futility specifically at the time of transition to the palliative care setting.

Aim: To study the phenomenon of pharmacologic therapeutic futility at the time of transition of a cancer patient to palliative care.

Design: The pharmacological prescriptions at the time of the first appointment at an oncological palliative care unit during a time period of 2 months were prospectively collected and characterized using the Medication Appropriateness Index.

Participants: The sample comprised 71 patients with a mean age of 68.2 years.

Results: The most common pharmacological groups were analgesics (n = 121; 19.2%), psychoactive drugs (n = 89; 14.1%), and antihypertensives (n = 51; 8.1%). A total of 61 patients (85.9%) consumed 5 drugs or more at the time of the first appointment. The mean number of daily medications decreased significantly after the palliative care team intervention, from 7.15 to 5.73 (p < 0.05). The principal causes of inappropriateness were absence of indication for the drug (23.0% "inappropriate"), the drugs' adverse interactions (11.1%), and inadequate dosage (9.9%). After the first consultation in the palliative care setting, 28.2% of the drugs were suspended.

Conclusion: This article tried to evaluate the main causes of therapeutic futility at the palliative care transition. The principal causes of inappropriateness were absence of clinical indication, clinically significant drug-disease/comorbidity interactions, and incorrect dosage/posology.