Literature Review

Man killed elderly parents, partner and himself in murder-suicide at SW Miami-Dade home NBC 6 South Florida; by Laura Rodriguez; 6/3/24A man shot and killed his elderly parents and partner before turning the gun on himself in a murder-suicide at a home in southwest Miami-Dade Sunday, police and family members said. According to police, [Jesus] Regueira [Jr.] shot and killed his parents, 83-year-old Jesus Regueira Sr. and 84-year-old Mercedes Morato, 61-year-old Kyrsten Stahre, who police identified as his girlfriend but family members said was his wife, before turning the gun on himself. ... The bodies were first discovered by family friend Joanna Cruz, whose mother was bringing food to Morato, who was under hospice care. ... “I think the problem was his mom had a severe stroke and she was in hospice and his mom was his life. Because someone had said that he wasn’t handling it well. The mom was there, but she had hospice coming in. His mom was his favorite person in the world. I don't know about the dad but I just know that’s probably what happened," Carol Miloch said. Editor's Note: Workplace violence in healthcare settings continues to rise, and to be a leading cause for nurse unionization and strikes.

Screening tool predicts older adults’ need for end-of-life care interventionMcKnight's Long-Term Care News; by Donna Shryer; 6/2/24A computerized tool can accurately identify older adults visiting the emergency department who have a high risk of dying within six months, a new study found. The tool, called the Geriatric End-of-Life Screening Tool, or GEST, performed more reliably than reviewing diagnosed serious illnesses and estimating mortality rate. GEST uses routine medical data such as age, vital signs, blood tests and past hospitalizations to calculate each person’s individualized mortality risk over the next six months. In the study of more than 80,000 emergency department visits by older adults, GEST maintained high accuracy regardless of the person’s gender, race/ethnicity or year of visit.

Oregon reviews UnitedHealth deal for Amedisys home health, hospice The Lund Report; by Nick Budnick; 6/4/24State officials are asking members of the public to weigh on the proposed acquisition of Amedisys — a hospice and home health and company that operates in Roseburg, Salem and Portland — by an increasingly controversial health care giant called UnitedHealth Group. Inc.  UnitedHealth operates Optum, a subsidiary whose takeover of a clinic chain in the Eugene area has sparked numerous complaints. The state recently approved the company's acquisition of  The Corvallis Clinic, an 11-clinic company operating in three counties. Now, it proposes to take over the Oregon offices of a Amedisys, a publicly traded firm, and the transaction has federal officials contemplating a lawsuit to block it. UnitedHealth and Optum are under increasing scrutiny for their market dominance and allegations of anticompetitive conduct.

Normandy Welcomes World War II Heroes - 80th AnniversaryU.S. Department of Defense; 6/4/24World War II veterans met with cheers and applause from throngs of well-wishers as they arrived in Normandy, France, for events commemorating the 80th anniversary of D-Day. ... The number of these heroes at D-Day anniversary events in Normandy each year is diminishing, but the gratitude and awe for their service and sacrifice endures.We Honor Veterans - NHPCONHPCO; retrieved from the internet on 6/5/24We Honor Veterans empowers end-of-life care partners to meet the unique needs of America’s Veterans and their families. Our guidance and resources are focused on respectful inquiry, compassionate listening and grateful acknowledgment so that veterans can be guided through their life stories toward a more peaceful ending.Editor's Note: Thank you NHPCO for your foresight in developing this program! You identified the massive losses of our WWII generation of veterans (and more). You educated hospice organizations nation-wide and equipped us with meaningful resources, while we still had years of time to provide active support.

Community Hospice & Palliative Care setting sights on Florida, Georgia expansionHospice News; by Holly Vossel; 6/3/24Florida-based Community Hospice & Palliative Care recently opened a new location in its home state that will serve as an office for interdisciplinary staff and a community center. The new center is a key part of the hospice and palliative care provider’s overall strategic growth plans to improve access among underserved populations, according to Community CEO Phillip Ward. ... One aim of launching the center is to improve care collaboration and access among African Americans in the community, according to Ward.

LeadingAge: CMS on right track with high-acuity hospice RFIHospice News; by Jim Parker; 5/31/24 The senior care advocacy group LeadingAge has praised the U.S. Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS) inquiries into high-acuity palliative care, but expressed concern over reimbursement and staffing issues. The agency’s 2025 proposed hospice rule featured a series of requests for information (RFI) on issues like health equity, social determinants of health and future quality measures. The RFIs contain further questions about the utilization of higher-cost palliative treatments under the Medicare Hospice Benefit. The agency posed similar queries in its proposed rule for 2024. The new proposal seeks greater clarity on the financial risks and costs that providers say represent barriers to providing those services, such as palliative chemotherapy, radiation blood transfusions or dialysis, among others.

Lessons learned establishing the Palliative Care Research Cooperative's Qualitative Data Repository Journal of Pain and Symptom Management; Salimah H Meghani, Kim Mooney-Doyle, Amber Barnato, Kathryn Colborn, Riley Gillette, Krista L Harrison, Pamela S Hinds, Dessi Kirilova, Kathleen Knafl, Dena Schulman-Green, Kathryn I Pollak, Christine S Ritchie, Jean S Kutner, Sebastian Karcher; 5/31/24 ... The [Palliative Care Research Cooperative Group] PCRC Data Informatics and Statistics Core leadership partnered with the Qualitative Data Repository (QDR) to establish the first serious illness and palliative care qualitative data repository in the U.S. ... Specifically, we discuss how we co-designed the PCRC-QDR and created tailored guidelines for depositing and sharing qualitative data depending on the original research context, establishing uniform expectations for key components of relevant documentation, and the use of suitable access controls for sensitive data. ... This work advances the establishment of best practices in qualitative data sharing.

Hawaiʻi is the first state to provide palliative care coverage EIN Presswire; by Governor JOsh Green, MD; 4/4/24 Governor Josh Green, M.D., and the Department of Human Services (DHS) Med-QUEST Division are pleased to announce that the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) approved a new State Plan Amendment (SPA) to cover community palliative care services through Medicaid, making Hawaiʻi the first state in the nation to do so.  ... “After several years of hard work and collaboration with many community members and experts in the field, I am proud to announce that Med-QUEST is the first Medicaid program in the country to get this benefit approved,” said Governor Green. “This will greatly improve the quality of life and health outcomes for thousands of people who face serious medical conditions in our state. Hawaiʻi continues to lead the nation in innovations in health and health care.”  

What health system CEOs need to tackle conflict, change Becker's Hospital Review; by Laura Dyrda; 5/31/24  Health system CEOs are leaving behind ego-driven, top down leadership in favor of a trusting and a supportive culture to guide their organizations and transform healthcare delivery. Change is hard, but necessary, to grow. "One of my greatest realizations is the importance of fostering a culture where every individual genuinely feels valued and supported," K. Craig Kent, MD, CEO of Charlottesville, VA.-based UVA Health and executive vice president of health affairs at the University of Virginia told Becker's. ... Change is happening on many fronts. More care is exiting the hospital to be delivered at outpatient sites, in the home and through virtual connections. Patients are more actively participating in decision-making about their care, and digital technology makes it possible to personalize care more than ever before. ...

Palliative care significantly improves discussion and documentation of end-of-life care preferences among patients with AML and MDS Oncology Learning Network; transcribed interview featuring Areej El-Jawahri, MD; 6/1/24 Areej El-Jawahri, MD, Massachusetts General Hospital, Boston, Massachusetts, discusses results from a clinical trial comparing a collaborative palliative and oncology care model vs usual care for adult patients with acute myeloid leukemia (AML) and high-risk myelodysplastic syndrome (MDS). The study showed that palliative care significantly improved the rates of discussion and documentation of end-of-life (EOL) care preferences, reduced hospitalization at the EOL, and improved the quality of life in patients. 

There is a crack in everything, that’s how the light gets in. – Leonard Cohen

Most people don’t get the end-of-life care they really want. Here’s what you can do to change that.[Maria Shriver's] Sunday Paper; by Karen Spencer; 6/1/24My mother died of cancer in 2011, when I was in my 30s. My father had died a decade earlier, and most of our family lived far away. So even though I lived in Boston and my mom was in Denver, we had to figure out how I could help care for her from a distance. ... Here are 3 lessons I’ve learned along the way that I hope will help you, too.

How hospice valuations are shaping up in 2024Hospice News; by Jim Parker; 5/30/24When it comes to hospice acquisitions, buyers’ and sellers’ expectations on price tags are becoming more aligned. A surge of deals in 2021 and 2022 led to record-high valuations in the space with multiples reaching in excess of 30x in some instances. While many buyers were willing to pay that premium, some stepped out of the market due to the high valuations. But deal volume has largely declined in late 2023 and early 2024, and valuations are starting to come down.