Table 1 ACT/RCPCH Categories[6]
From: Paediatric palliative care: development and pilot study of a ‘Directory’ of life-limiting conditions
Category | Key characteristic | Description | Examples |
|---|---|---|---|
I | Potential for cure - life is threatened, not necessarily limited. | Conditions for which treatment may be feasible but can fail | Cancer |
Some cardiac anomalies | |||
II | Period of normality despite having fatal diagnosis. | Conditions where premature death is inevitable but where there may be long periods of participation in normal activities | Duchenne Muscular Dystrophy |
III | Relentless deterioration from, or before, time of diagnosis. | Progressive conditions without curative treatment options, where treatment is exclusively palliative and commonly extends over many years | Metabolic or neurodegenerative conditions |
IV | Unpredictable course whose progression is not easily judged from natural history. | Irreversible but non-progressive conditions causing likelihood of premature death through complications | Severe cerebral palsy |
Traumatic brain injury | |||
Septic brain injury |