Systematic Reviews
Copyright ©The Author(s) 2023. Published by Baishideng Publishing Group Inc. All rights reserved.
World J Clin Cases. May 6, 2023; 11(13): 2966-2980
Published online May 6, 2023. doi: 10.12998/wjcc.v11.i13.2966
Palliative oral care in terminal cancer patients: Integrated review
Ana Rute Preis Silva, Augusto Vanni Bodanezi, Emanuely Silva Chrun, Mariah Luz Lisboa, Alessandra R de Camargo, Etiene Andrade Munhoz
Ana Rute Preis Silva, Augusto Vanni Bodanezi, Alessandra R de Camargo, Department of Dentistry, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis 88040-379, Brazil
Emanuely Silva Chrun, Department of Pathology, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis 88040900, Brazil
Mariah Luz Lisboa, Professor Polydoro São Thiago Ernani Hospital, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis 88040900, Brazil
Etiene Andrade Munhoz, Department of Dentistry, Health Science Centre, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Florianopolis 88040-379, Brazil
Author contributions: Silva ARP, Chrun ES and Lisboa ML contributed selecting eligible articles, reading in full those previous selected articles, collecting, tabulating and analyzing data; Munhoz EA, de Camargo AR and Bodanezi AV contributed on conception and design of the work; or the acquisition, analysis, or interpretation of data for the work; Munhoz EA also contributed on drafting the work and revising it critically for important intellectual content; All authors had revised and approved the final version of the manuscript.
Conflict-of-interest statement: All the authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.
PRISMA 2009 Checklist statement: The authors have read the PRISMA 2009 Checklist, and the manuscript was prepared and revised according to the PRISMA 2009 Checklist.
Open-Access: This article is an open-access article that was selected by an in-house editor and fully peer-reviewed by external reviewers. It is distributed in accordance with the Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial (CC BY-NC 4.0) license, which permits others to distribute, remix, adapt, build upon this work non-commercially, and license their derivative works on different terms, provided the original work is properly cited and the use is non-commercial. See: https://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by-nc/4.0/
Corresponding author: Etiene Andrade Munhoz, DDS, MSc, PhD, Associate Professor, Professor, Department of Dentistry, Health Science Centre, Federal University of Santa Catarina, Delfino Conti St, Florianopolis 88040-379, Brazil. etiamfob@yahoo.com
Received: December 21, 2022
Peer-review started: December 21, 2022
First decision: February 8, 2023
Revised: March 7, 2023
Accepted: April 4, 2023
Article in press: April 4, 2023
Published online: May 6, 2023
Processing time: 124 Days and 14.5 Hours
Abstract
BACKGROUND

Palliative care (PC) aims to improve quality of life in patients and its families against life threatening diseases, through suffering’s prevention and relief. It is the duty of the dental surgeon to possess the knowledge needed to treat a patient with little life span, in order to establish an adequate treatment plan for each situation.

AIM

To synthesize the published evidence on oral conditions, impact, management and challenges in managing oral conditions among palliative patients.

METHODS

Articles were selected from PubMed and Scopus electronic platforms, using a research strategy with diverse descriptors related to “palliative care”, “cancer” and “oral health”. The article’s selection was done in two phases. The first one was performed by the main researcher through the reading of the abstracts. In the second phase two researchers selected eligible articles after reading in full those previous selected. Data was tabulated and analyzed, obtaining information about what is found in literature related to this subject and what is necessary to be approached in future researches about PC.

RESULTS

As results, the total of 15 articles were eligible, being one a qualitative analysis, 13 (92.8%) clinical trials and one observational study. Of the 15 articles, 8 (53.4%) involved questionnaires, while the rest involved: one systematic review about oral care in a hospital environment, 2 oral exams and oral sample collection, one investigation of terminal patient’s (TP) oral assessment records, 2 collection of oral samples and their respective analysis and one treatment of the observed oral complications.

CONCLUSION

It can be concluded that the oral manifestations in oncologic patients in terminal stage are, oral candidiasis, dry mouth, dysphagia, dysgeusia, oral mucositis and orofacial pain. Determining a protocol for the care of these and other complications of cancer – or cancer therapy – based on scientific evidence with the latest cutting-edge research results is of fundamental importance for the multidisciplinary team that works in the care of patients in PC. To prevent complications and its needed to initial the dentist as early as possible as a multidisciplinary member. It has been suggested palliative care protocol based on the up to date literature available for some frequent oral complications in TP with cancer. Other complications in terminal patients and their treatments still need to have further studying.

Keywords: Palliative care; Oral lesion; Terminal patients, Oral mucositis, Oral candidiasis

Core Tip: Palliative care aims to improve quality of life in patients in terminal diseases, through suffering’s prevention and relief. It is the duty of the dental surgeon to possess the knowledge needed to treat them. This integrative review aimed to synthesize the published evidence on oral conditions and their management among palliative patients. The most prevalent oral manifestations in end-stage cancer patients are xerostomia, oral candidiasis, dysphagia, dysgeusia, oral mucositis, and orofacial pain. Information on the behavior of oral manifestations and their treatments is lacking and there is little participation of the dental community. Also, updated protocols should be stablished. Palliative care, oral lesion, terminal patients Palliative care, oral lesion, terminal patients.