Abstract Context: Palliative care practice, education, research and administration depend upon an evidence-based shared interpersonal decision-making process which in turn is based upon individual knowledge/awareness and existing research evidence. Aims: This study aimed to perform a quantitative analysis of research publications in palliative care journals for reporting of articles on knowledge and awareness. Settings and Design: Systematic review of palliative care journals. Methods and Material: Twelve palliative care journals were searched for articles with ‘knowledge’ or ‘awareness’ in title of the articles published from 2006-2011. The reporting rates of all journals were compared. The selected articles were categorized into assessment and treatment which were subsequently grouped into original and review articles. The original articles were sub-grouped into qualitative and quantitative studies, and the review articles were grouped into narrative and systematic reviews. Each subgroup of original articles category was further classified according to study designs and target sample populations. Statistical Analysis Used: Descriptive analysis using frequencies and percentiles was done using SPSS for Windows version 11.5. Results: The overall reporting rate among all journals was 1.50% (43/2854) and Indian Journal of Palliative Care (IJPC) had the highest reporting rate of 6.48% (7/108) followed by BMC Palliative Care (BMCPC) at 3.37% (3/89), and Journal of Palliative Medicine (JPM) at 1.67% (11/657). Conclusions: The overall reporting rate for knowledge/awareness articles in palliative care journals was 1.5% and there were no randomized clinical trials and systematic reviews found. The study findings indicate a lack of adequate evidence base for knowledge/awareness in palliative care literature.
Keywords: Evidence-Based Palliative Care; Research; Journal Reporting; Publication Trend; Knowledge/Awareness.