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Learning Objective 1: The learner will be able toidentify the several factors related to decision-making preferences in health care.
Learning Objective 2: The learner will be able toconsider cultural aspect related to decision-making preference in health care.
Methods: A structured self-descriptive questionnaire was administered to the healthy adults in Japan. The questionnaire about decision-making preferences composed 6 items based on 2 hypothetical clinical vignettes with the different stages of the stomach cancer developed by Ohki (Ohki, 2005). And it also was asked what extents of own, family’s, and physician’s opinions were weighted. The family function was measured by the Family Assessment Device (FAD), and it was originally developed by Epstein, et. al. (Epstein, 1983) and translated into Japanese (Saeki, 1997).
Results: 19 males and 23 females with average age of 59.0 (SD=12.6) years answered the questionnaires. The decision-making score of oneself for the life style in the early stage of cancer were significant higher than those for the treatment style. The scores of physician for the life style were lower than those for examination and treatment style. The scores of physician for the life-prolonging treatment in the terminal stage were significantly lower than those for the treatment decision. A multiple regression analysis identified several factors including some aspects of family function for predicting decision-making preference in the early stage cancer setting.
Conclusion: The decision-making preferences toward the vignettes in health care were varied, but they thought that family could involve in the health care decision-making related to cancer.
This study was subsidized by Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (C) 21592732, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science.