UL research aims to improve diagnosis and management of delirium among palliative care patients

85% of patients experience delirium during the terminal phases of illness.

University of Limerick (UL) researchers have been awarded €175,000 to undertake research which aims to improve diagnosis and management of delirium, dementia and depression among palliative care patients. This research is funded by the Health Research Board (HRB) and the All Ireland Institute of Hospice & Palliative Care (AIIHPC).

Principal Investigator and Professor of Psychiatry at UL, David Meagher explains the significance of the research; “Previous research has found that 85% of patients experience delirium during the terminal phases of illness. Unfortunately, many of these cases go undiagnosed and we know that particularly among elderly patients, the risk of mortality increases by 11% for each additional 48 hours of delirium experienced.”

“This has been an underestimated problem for some time and denies patients and their families of precious final ‘real’ contact during their illness. Medicine has largely focused on treating the problem of terminal pain but there is a need to focus on the impact delirium and other causes of cognitive impairment have for palliative care patients.”

Through the Cognitive Impairment Research Group (CIRG) based at the Centre for Interventions in Inflammation, Infection & Immunity (4i), UL, Professor Meagher and his team will focus on identifying early indicators of emerging delirium using technology to develop tools which will allow more consistent detection of delirium. 

The study involves significant collaboration with Dr Karen Ryan, of Mater Misericordiae Hospital & St Francis Hospice, and forms a part of the wider multidisciplinary Palliative Care Research Network supported by funding provided by the Irish HRB, Northern Ireland Public Health Agency, Irish Cancer Society and the Atlantic Philanthropies. 

Director of the Centre for Interventions in Inflammation, Infection & Immunity (4i), UL, Professor Colum Dunne, said “this study builds on on-going work, also funded by the HRB, which is developing novel software applications to enable bedside assessment of cognitive impairment. By extending the boundaries of these developments in this new study, Prof Meagher and his colleagues are translating sophisticated technological developments into tangible advances that will allow rapid, effective, standardised and uncomplicated assessment of delirium. This innovation is especially relevant to the hospice and palliative care setting”.