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Palliative Care in Hospitals Surges 63 Percent in
Three Years
For-profit hospitals lag behind academic and
non-profit medical centers
 Dec.
12, 2005 - Palliative care programs continue to increase rapidly in U.S.
hospitals a trend widely regarded to be an improvement in the quality
of care of advanced chronic illness. The study released today in the
Journal of Palliative Medicine shows 25 percent of U.S. hospitals
offered palliative care in 2003.
Researchers at the Mount Sinai Medical Center and
the American Hospital Association (AHA) report that the number of
palliative care programs increased from 632 (15% of hospitals) in 2000
to 1,027 (25% of hospitals) in 2003 - a 63% increase in only three
years.
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"This is a win-win for both patients and hospitals.
Palliative care programs provide quality, efficient and cost-effective
care focused directly on our sickest and most complex patients.
Hospitals recognize that the cost of not providing this type of care is
just too high," said Dr. Sean Morrison, one of the study's authors and
Vice-Chair of Research, Department of Geriatrics at the Mount Sinai
Medical Center.
Although growth occurred nationwide, larger
hospitals, not-for-profit hospitals, academic medical centers and VA
hospitals were more likely to have a program compared to other
hospitals. The New England, Pacific, and Mountain regions of the country
were also much more likely to have programs.
The goal of palliative care is to relieve suffering
and ensure the best possible quality of life for people facing advanced
chronic and life-threatening illness. It is provided alongside all other
appropriate curative treatment. Hospital palliative care programs have
been associated with improvements in both healthcare quality and
healthcare costs.
By 2030, 20% of the U.S. population will be over 65
and most will eventually have one or more chronic illnesses. "Patient
demands are changing. People want quality of life and relief from
suffering. Usually palliative care programs are flooded with referrals
once word gets out that a program has been started," commented Dr. Diane
Meier, Director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care and one of the
study's authors.
The study was compiled using the most recent data
(2003) from the AHA Annual Survey of Hospitals 2005. It represents an
update of an earlier report published in 2001 and provides the first
follow-up to Means to a Better End: A Report on Dying in America Today
(November 2002). Key findings included:
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What is Palliative Care? |
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For the last thirty years, palliative (pah-lee-uh-tive)
care has been provided by hospice programs for dying Americans.
Currently these programs serve more than 1 million patients and
their families each year. Now this very same approach to care
is being used by other health care providers, including teams in
hospitals, nursing facilities and home health agencies in
combination with other medical treatments to help people who are
seriously ill.
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Each of us has the
right to die
pain-free and
with dignity. |
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To palliate means to make comfortable by
treating a persons symptoms from an illness. Hospice and
palliative care both focus on helping a person be comfortable by
addressing issues causing physical or emotional pain, or
suffering. Hospice and other palliative care providers have
teams of people working together to provide care. The goals of
palliative care are to improve the quality of a seriously ill
persons life and to support that person and their family during
and after treatment.
Hospice focuses on relieving symptoms and
supporting patients with a life expectancy of months not years,
and their families. However, palliative care may be given at
any time during a patients illness, from diagnosis on. Most
hospices have a set of defined services, team members and rules
and regulations. Some hospices provide palliative care as a
separate program or service, which can be very confusing to
patients and families. The list of questions below provides
answers to common questions about the difference between hospice
and palliative care. |
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● Palliative care programs are more readily
available to people in hospitals in the Northeast, Pacific, and Mountain
regions than in other regions of the country.
● Larger hospitals, academic medical centers,
not-for-profit hospitals (including those affiliated with the Catholic
Church) and VA hospitals are significantly more likely to develop
palliative care programs as compared to city, county and state and
for-profit hospitals.
● Hospitals are more likely to have a palliative
care program if they own their own hospice.
● Hospitals are more likely to have a palliative
care program if they have an American College of Surgeons cancer
program.
Factors that were cited as possible reasons for the
rapid growth in palliative care programs were:
● The increase in the numbers and costs of
caring for chronically ill Medicare patients. Palliative care programs
have been proven to reduce costs.
● Studies that have shown inadequate treatment
of pain and symptoms, poor communication and coordination of care.
● And, the hundreds of millions of dollars that
have been invested in the growth of the field by the Robert Wood Johnson
Foundation and others.
About source:
The Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC),
located at the Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York City, is a
national initiative of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. CAPC provides
hospitals and other healthcare settings with the tools and technical
assistance to develop hospital-based palliative care programs.
www.capc.org.
Links:
National Hospice
and Palliative Care Organization
Center to Advance Palliative Care
(Includes links to programs around the U.S.)
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