Reducing moral distress through interdisciplinary collaboration: the impact of a weekly palliative care and neonatology conference
A NICU and palliative care-weekly-collaborative conference resulted in significantly decreased moral distress among NICU staff. Qualitative data revealed that both prolonging life with life-sustaining medical therapies (LSMTs) and ending it by withdrawing LSMTs in the context of prognostic uncertainty and institutional constraints creates significant moral distress among staff. Palliative care and NICU programs should consider implementing regular interdisciplinary collaborative conferences to address this distress.
Authors
- James E. Slaven (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6744-3821)
- Jayme D. Allen (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0005-6625-4518)
- Rebecca Baker (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9436-7329)
- Riddhi Shukla (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5768-1167)
- Karen Moody (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4168-2864)
- Rachel Boren (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8670-6543)
- Kirthi Devireddy
Institutions
- Indiana University Health (US)
- The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center (US)
- Children's Cancer Center (US)
- MD Anderson Cancer Center Madrid (ES)
- Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis (US)
- The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (US)
Publication Details
- Journal
- BMC Palliative Care
- Published
- 2025-11-11
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1186/s12904-025-01915-y
- Primary Topic
- Ethics in medical practice
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 0.00
Funders
- Indiana University Health