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The Palliative care Outcome Scale (POS) is a resource for palliative care practice, teaching and research. This website has been established by a not-for-profit organisation to help advance measurement in palliative care. Free resources and training are available.
 
The POS measures are a family of tools to measure patients' physical symptoms, psychological, emotional and spiritual, and information and support needs. They are validated instrument that can be used in clinical care, audit, research and training.
 
The POS measures are specifically developed for use among people severely affected by diseases such as cancer, respiratory, heart, renal or liver failure, and neurological diseases.
 
The POS measures are widely used globally including in Europe, Australia, Asia, Africa and America.
 
POS can be downloaded from this website and is available in 12 languages including English.
 
POS-S is an additional module for symptoms. Extended versions are available for patients living with different conditions such as multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s disease and end-stage renal disease.
 
IPOS is our new measure which incorporates the best of POS, POS-S and APCA African POS.
 
The POS measures are used in different settings, including home, hospital, hospice and, nursing home.
 
MyPOS is a new measure to assess the symptoms and concerns of people affected by myeloma, and is designed to help practice and care during chemotherapy and other treatments, or in advanced disease.
 
C-POS:UK is a measure being developed to assess the symptoms and concerns of children and young people living with health conditions that are life-limiting or life-threatening, and the concerns of their families.
 
 
POS Workshops
 
The annual Palliative Outcome Scale (POS + IPOS) Training Days will be held in HYBRID format on May 1st and 2nd 2024. There is more information on the POS Workshops page. Register here.
 
FAQ              
 
 
More questions - read our FAQ section or .
 
Resources
 
You will have free access to all the POS family resources and be kept up to date with POS developments and opportunities after you register (registration is free and takes only few minutes).
 
Get involved
 
We are always looking for academic and clinical centres interested in translating and validating POS measures in new languages, settings and disease groups. .
 
We also want to hear from professionals using POS measures locally and nationally.
 
 
  News and Events
 
We would like to congratulate a team of Palliative Care and Oncology practitioners at a Veterans hospital in the United States on a quality of life project that utilised the IPOS. More details and photos of the team.
 
The Malay IPOS translation is now available for download.
 
The Persian POS v2 translation is now available for download.
 
Exciting new post at CSI for a research associate to support the development and delivery of a new programme of research to improve care for patients and families facing progressive illness. See details.
 
This site had a major upgrade on 20th Nov. It should now be back to normal but if you discover any anomalies please .
 
The Cicely Saunders International Annual Lecture will taking place virtually on Wednesday 8 December 2021 (17.00 – 18.00). Professor Per Sjøgren from the University of Copenhagen will talk about the changing landscape of pain management in palliative care. You can register on Eventbrite.
 
Researchers in Japan, Korea, and Taiwan used IPOS as part of the "East-Asian collaborative cross-cultural Study to Elucidate the Dying process". This was a multi-aim, multi-center, prospective, observational study involving over 2000 cancer patients admitted to palliative care units. The first report is now available.
 
The validation of the IPOS to European Portuguese is just out on BMC Palliative Care.
 
We are delighted to announce that the Cicely Saunders Institute's Triennial Report 2017-2020 has been published and can be downloaded here. The report features a wide-range of the Institute's work, including evaluating and improving care, network partnerships and engagements, education and capacity building.
 
New report out now: Experiences, concerns, and priorities for palliative care research during the COVID-19 pandemic: A rapid virtual stakeholder consultation with people affected by serious illness in England.
 
Members of the Cicely Saunders Institute undertook a secondary analysis of older adults with advanced cancer or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease in the UK, Ireland, and USA. They found disability in activities of daily living is highly prevalent and associated with greater symptom burden. Individual disability profiles and trajectories are diverse and require individualised rehabilitation intervention.
 
We congratulate Bárbara Antunes on her new role as a NIHR ARC Research Associate at the Primary Care Unit of the University of Cambridge. As a former member of our staff we celebrate this and future achievements and wish her all the best.
 
New OPEN ACCESS paper published on screening for depression and anxiety using the Integrated Palliative care Outcome Scale: Determining the prevalence of palliative needs and exploring screening accuracy of depression and anxiety items of the integrated palliative care outcome scale – a multi-centre study.
 
The C-POS study, funded by the European Research Council, is aiming to develop a novel person-centred outcome measure for use in paediatric palliative care. Phase 1 of the study is currently underway in the UK interviewing children, parents, siblings, healthcare professionals and commissioners to establish priorities to include in the C-POS measure. More information is on our website.
 
The Estonian IPOS translations are now available for download.
 
The India/Hindi IPOS translation is now available for download.
 
Call for Papers: Journal Public Health has announced a Palliative Care Special Issue featuring Irene Higginson a guest editor alongside David Currow and Luc Deliens. Deadline for submission is 31st July 2020. Click here for further information.
 
Congratulations to Professor Irene Higginson who has been named as a Highly Cited Researcher 2019. This award recognises the world's most influential researchers, demonstrated by authorship of multiple papers ranking in the top 1% by citations in their field.
 
Dr Tetsuya Ito and team explored factors associated with anxiety in 86 newly admitted palliative care patients at Japanese Red Cross Medical Center with Japanese STAS. Preliminary analyses suggested that symptom control improved however anxiety levels increased two weeks following admission. Communication and insight may be associated with heightened anxiety.
 
CSI's MSc in Palliative Care achieved 100% overall satisfaction for the second year running in the Postgraduate Taught Experience Survey (PTES) results.
 
CLAHRC South London has been successful in a bid to the National Institute of Health Research (NIHR) securing funding up to £9 million for the next five years to become the Applied Research Collaboration (ARC) South London (read more).
 
Veronese et al (2019) in their study on translation and cognitive testing of the Italian IPOS among patients and healthcare professionals report that Italian IPOS is valid for use in clinical settings.
 
We are looking forward to welcoming more than 100 delegates from all over the world at the POS Workshops 2019. Registration for the Clinical Day (Feb 7th) is now closed. Limited spaces are available for the Research Day (Feb 8th).
 
Developments in the new Integrated Palliative Care Outcome Scale(IPOS). Team from New Zealand and UK report the first published Rasch analysis of the IPOS; results support its use as a clinical and research measure.
 
Clare Ellis-Smith wins National Institute for Health Research Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care (NIHR CLAHRC) Most Original Research Paper Award for her publication in PLOS One evaluating IPOS-Dem in care homes.
 
The programmes for the POS Workshops in February have been updated. Details are on POS workshops Feb 2019 page.
 
IPOS-Renal adapted for those with advanced kidney disease has been tested and found to be useful. Details of the study can be found here. IPOS-Renal can be downloaded here.
 
The deadline for submission of abstracts for the POS Workshops has been extended to 5th December 2018.
 
The next Cicely Saunders Institute Open Seminar is on Wednesday 28th October 4-5pm. Entitled Health, till death do us part? Impact of spousal bereavement on health and mortality among older adults in Sweden it will be presented by Lucas Morin from the Ageing Research Center of Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden. It is free to attend, with no need to register. It is also worth 1 CPD point. Please find further information here.
 
Professor Richard Harding chaired a session on “Use of patient-reported outcome measures to drive up quality” at the World Cancer Congress, Kuala Lumpur in October 2018. He also met with with Hospis Malaysia. Details and a photo here.
 
The next Cicely Saunders Institute Open Seminar is on Wednesday 26 th September 4-5pm. Entitled Assisted Ventilation to Prolong Life: a Matter of Choice it will be presented by Dr Louise Rose from Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, Canada. It is free to attend, with no need to register. It is also worth 1 CPD point. Please find further information here.
 
 
On 25th July 2018 Dr Jamilla Hussain from Hull York Medical School is giving a talk entitled Why Missing Data Matter as part of the Cicely Saunders Institute Open Seminar Series. The seminar is free to attend. Find out more here.
 
Dr. J Randall Curtis from the University of Washington is giving an open seminar entitled "Integrating Palliative and Critical Care: Lessons from Recent Trials" at the Cicely Saunders Institute on Wednesday 27th June at 4pm.
 
The next event in the Cicely Saunders Institute Open Seminar Series entitled Reciprocal Relationships and the Importance of Patient and Public Feedback in Health Research by Dr. Elspeth Mathie will take place on Wednesday 30th May, 4-5pm. The seminar is free for all to attend and no advanced booking is required. Find out more here.
 
It's the 10th World Research Congress of the EAPC in Bern, Switzerland from 24-26 May 2018. Guess what! the POS family of measures and projects are waiting for you at the "King's College London Cicely Saunders Institute stand". Time: first coffee break from 10.30 to 11.00 am on both Friday and Saturday (25th and 26th May).
 
The POS team published a letter about the findings from an outcome measurement workshop held at the 12th Asia Pacific Hospice Conference in Singapore.
 
Great news, the Portuguese IPOS team have published their protocol for their full validation study. Click to download.
 
The Portuguese version of the IPOS developed by Barbra Antunes and team is now available for download.
 
New study from Malaysia finds POS to be an acceptable and reliable assessment tool.
 
POS Team attending 12th Asia Pacific Hospice Conference in Singapore, on 27-29 July 2017.
 
 
 
New paper published by Clare Ellis-Smith. Development of a measure for people with dementia: the IPOS-Dem.
 
 
New Polish IPOS available for download.
Visit or follow the POS Team appearing at the 2017 EAPC Conference in Madrid, Spain on 18-20 May 2017.
 
Successful POS training at Island Hospice Harare, Zimbabwe more details.
 
 
Interesting article in the Atlantic How to Find Meaning in the Face of Death by Emily E Smith.
 
New Spanish POS-S Renal available for download and validation published in BMC Nephrology.
 
IPOS-Dem for people with dementia in care homes is developed and is now available for download. A paper reporting its development has been published by Clare Ellis-Smith.
 
Great News, Cicely Saunders Institute gains an Athena SWAN Silver Award!
 
Eve Namisango, Research Manager at APCA and BUILDcare Africa PhD fellow at the Cicely Saunders Institute, presented the Validation of the Children's POS in Uganda.
 
Dr K. Nkhoma, new Research Fellow at Cicely Saunders Institute presented an RCT of a pain education intervention for HIV, with APCA POS as an outcome measure.
 
The Italian version of the IPOS developed by Simone Veronese and Elisa Rabitti and their teams is now available for download.
 
'The woman who changed the face of death': Actress and writer, Maureen Lipman on Cicely Saunders for BBC Radio 4's 'Great Lives' programme at 4.30pm Tuesday 6th September.
 
 
Dr Thomas Osborne has been awarded a PHD for his thesis on the Development and Validation of a questionnaire for use in the Clinical Setting to Aid the Assessment of Quality of Life in people with multiple Myeloma Patient Outcome Scale (MyPOS) supervised by Prof. Irene Higginson. Picture       Research Outputs.
 
The Swedish version of the IPOS developed by Carl Johan Fürst, Ingela Beck and their team is now available for download.
 
Great discussion between haematologists, palliativists, nurses, researchers, patients and families at yesterday's Quality of life in multiple myeloma conference on the development, validation and use of the MyPOS to understand patient's quality of life concerns.
 
The myeloma-specific version of the POS (MyPOS) is now available to download.
Over 2,500 downloads have been reached in last few months, with top items being the Clinical Decision Support Tool and Patient Reported Outcome Measure booklets.
 
The German version of the IPOS created by Professor Claudia Bausewein, Dr Eva Schildmann and team is now available on the website.
 
Now available; a Clinical Decision Support Tool for using POS in clinical practice & Guidance for Implementing PROMS in clinical care; including a newly published paper. Free to download.
 
POS mentioned in a Marie Curie recent publication "triggers for palliative care: improving access to care for people with disease other than cancer" see executive summary p8.
 
Recently published EAPC White Paper - essential reading for those thinking about using or currently using outcome measurement in their organisation or country.
 
IPOS-Renal is now available to download here. Developed due to demand from clinicians to merge IPOS and POS-S.
 
The OACC Palliative Care Outcome Measures Resource Pack from the CSI and Hospice UK are now available to buy.
 
POS-users in the USA; Professor Irene Higginson is presenting at the World Congress of Psycho-Oncology in Washington DC from 28 July to 1 August 2015.
 
New Japanese POS versions now available to download from the POS website.
 
Pictures, tweets and feedback from the workshops held in Feb 2015 are now on this page.
 
Would you like to share your experience of implementing or using the POS measures? We will help you to write a short blog. Let us know .
 
Congratulations to Christina Ramsenthaler who gave a very interesting presentation on MyPOS validation results at the EAPC plenary session on Saturday 9th May. It was chosen from among 1230 submitted abstracts for a plenary presentation.
 
Also at the EAPC congress: Richard Harding presented the results of TOPCare study, and Claudia Bausewein, Liesbeth van Vliet and Fliss Murtagh presented on implementation of outcome measures in clinical practice in which IPOS featured. Poster presentations featuring POS covered a variety of topics including implementation, cognitive interviews, and others.
 
The OPTCARE Neuro Newsletter is out.
 
Dr Richard Harding described the first validated tool for children (APCA C-POS) at the UK national paediatric palliative care conference. The analysis of C-POS is complete, and we look forward to sharing the tool on the POS website (more).
 
The Cicely Saunders Annual Lecture will be held on 6th July at the Institute and will be presented by Professor Eduardo Bruera, if you would like to reserve a place please .
 
The POS 2015 workshops took place on 5th and 6th February and were a tremendous success with delegates from the UK and international services attending. If you took part and would like to access the presentations, please login and visit the presentation page.
 
2014 REF results are out and POS case study is highly commended.
 
POS presentations were made by PhD students at the Psychological Medicine and Palliative Care PhD symposium held at the Cicely Saunders Institute on 27 November 2014.
 
 
POS is an important part of our submission to the 2014 Research Excellence Framework and you can read our POS submission here.
 
Two independent reports have been commissioned to investigate the global impact of the POS and how it is being used to improve care. Report on Impact of the Palliative care Outcome Scale and Impact of the APCA African Palliative Outcome Scale (POS) on care and practice.
 
Do you know the Dutch caregiver POS is now online?
 
More than 4000 registered users on POS website since it was launched in May 2011.
 
POS used in a randomised controlled trial for an integrated palliative and respiratory care service (Lancet Respir).
 
Prof Downing presented on POS paediatric latest developments at the 2nd Congress on Paediatric Palliative Care, Italy.
 
 
Outcome measures in palliative care: Using the POS family of measures workshops, book here now for 5th and 6th February 2015. Further details of the programmes will be available soon.
 
At the 20th Congress on Palliative care see Professor Irene Higginson's talk "Latest development in the palliative care outcome scale (POS)" and Christina Ramsenthaler's poster "Development and Validation of the Myeloma Patient Outcome Scale (MyPOS)".
 
GPonline article "Assessing anxiety in palliative care patients" featuring POS.
 
Transforming End of Life Care in Acute Hospitals Programme (Transform Programme) latest publication "Considerations on assurance and quality improvement for care in the last days of life in acute hospitals" featuring POS (p14).
 
St Raphael's Hospice quality account report 2013-14 Future planning priority using POS (p7).
 
POS has been used as one of the main outcome measures in a Dutch trial evaluating GP communication training
 
A very successful workshop took place at the CSI, in partnership with Help the Hospices, on Data and Outcome Measures. To access the presentations given by the speakers at this workshop please click here, and as well as the training booklet introducing a suite of measures for the Outcome Assessment and Complexity Collaborative (OACC) project.
 
First routine use of the African iPOS (integrated POS) in all palliative care services in Ghana. See this summary or the ehospice article.
 
POS is represented at the 8th World Research Congress of the European Palliative Care Association in Lleida, Spain. Liesbeth van Vliet is presenting her work "Development of a Decision Support Tool for Clinical End-users of POS: Findings from a Programme to Enhance Routine Clinical Outcome Tool Implementation". Please come and see us.
 
 
The BuildCARE conference: 'Access, Equity and Innovation in Palliative Care: Can we really afford and deliver quality for all in the future?' took place on Wednesday 7th May 2014.
 
The POS team was at the 10th Palliative Care Congress 12-14th March 2014 in Harrogate, UK.
 
POS-S Renal included in a review of PROM's for people with Chronic Kidney Disease by Oxford University.
 
The Integrated Palliative care Outcome Scale (IPOS) was received with much enthusiasm at the POS training days. Following feedback we are now making final adjustments to the measure. The IPOS is available to download from this website.
 
We welcome the new paper on use of POS in Africa by Defilippi and Downing published in the International Journal of Palliative Nursing More.
 
POS training days were held on the 10th and 11th February 2014. The presentations are available for attendees.
 
An exciting new study to validate the Integrated Palliative care Outcome Scale (IPOS) is now underway. The IPOS integrates the core POS and the symptom module (POS-S). IPOS is a brief tool for global measurement of palliative care concerns, suitable for completion by patients and health care staff in various care settings. This study is led from King’s College Hospital in London by Dr Fliss Murtagh, with several collaborating centres around the country. Parallel translation and validation studies are taking place in Germany, Greece, Portugal, Romania and Sweden. For questions please contact .
 
Todos os questionários POS e POS-S versão doente e staff estão agora disponíveis on-line/All Portuguese POS and POS-S questionnaires for patient and staff completion are now uploaded on the POS website (POS translations, POS-S translations).
 
The Argentinian questionnaires are now on the web site (POS translations).
 
Professor Irene Higginson, developer of POS, has been elected as a Fellow of the Academy of Medical Sciences. She is one of 44 leading medical experts elected this year.
 
A new systematic review shows that the POS is the most frequently used PROM in palliative care clinical practice. Implementing Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) in Palliative Care clinical practice: a systematic review of facilitators and barriers.
 
In June, Dr. Nobuhisa Nakajima (Palliative Care Physician based at the Higashi Sapporo Hospital in Japan) visited the Cicely Saunders Institute. He recently started working with testing and translating the Japanese POS. Read More.
 
Thanks to all who came to meet the POS team at the 13th World Congress of the EAPC in Prague (booth 23).
 
Another video on using POS in clinical settings is available on our YouTube channel (will open in a new window)
 
In Namibia, Catholic AIDS Action (CAA) worked with APCA to use POS for setting quality improvement priorities in patient care. It was also used to evaluate the impact on patient and carer outcomes of training and integrating palliative care into home based care. Palliative care has now been integrated into 96 service sites.
 
APCA POS used in a phase III RCT; read the protocol here: http://www.biomedcentral.com/1471-2334/12/288 (will open in a new window)
 
Another short introduction video on POS is available on our YouTube channel (will open in a new window)
 
A short "Introducing POS" video is available on the POS Video page.
 
POS training from 18-19 February 2013 is now over.
 
Initial validation of a Brazil version of POS is now close to completion.
 
The POS team is working towards completing the first e-learning module which will be available on this website.
 
POS to be used in a cross-national study involving US, Ireland and UK from November 2012.
 
POS and POS-S are being combined to form a new version called Integrated POS or IPOS.
 
POS featuring in Floriani Foundation website.
 
POS featuring in "best practice BMJ" under comprehensive palliative care assessment. 
 
Website has been “refreshed” hope you like it! More to come. Any ideas on how to improve the website or comments? please contact Peter.
Thanks BMJ Journals, for republishing our paper on "POS and STAS which questions are most useful? " in Postgrad Med J.
 
New manual available for download POS Manual for cross cultural adaptation and validation (opens in new window).
 
National developments in Wales means that I-POS is used routinely throughout the nation.
 
Brazilian POS validated version coming soon / A versão do POS em Português (Brasileiro) será disponibilizada em breve neste site.
 
Bulgarian POS validated version coming soon / Българският превод на POS - Измерване на резултатите от провежданите палиативни грижи - се подготвя и ще бъде на ваше разположение скоро.
 
Guidelines on cross-cultural adaptation and validation of the POS coming soon.
 
POS and STAS which questions are most useful? Higginson et al 2012.
 
Outcomes out of Africa Downing et al 2012.
 
Implementing PROM's in palliative care Bausewein et al 2011.
 
EAPC Taskforce on patient-reported outcome measurement in palliative care launched May 2011.
 
PRISMA-MoreCARE joint summit on outcome measurement - May 2011.
 
POS website launch at the 12th EAPC congress May 2011.
 
 
Tweets by CSI Palliative Care
 
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