Assessment of unmet needs and barriers to end-of-life care provision in Kazakhstan

Abstract

Palliative care, a holistic multidisciplinary approach for those persons with terminal diseases, providing relief for physical, emotional, psychosocial and spiritual suffering of both the patients and their families and to support the dignity of all involved in the process of dying¹. Palliative care has developed recently, and an understanding of unmet needs and barriers, especially in Kazakhstan, can be addressed through innovative rigorous qualitative research methods covering all the stakeholders involved. Palliative care is an integral Nazarbayev University’s commitment to improving health services in Kazakhstan. The published literature shows a lack of palliative care providers in Kazakhstan and the few existing services are underdeveloped2,3. Our current will substantially characterize more in-depth and more broadly on opportunities and barriers for national expansion of quality palliative care in Kazakhstan.