Literature Review

Palliative care could be a game changer for public health Harvard Public Health, by Meredith Lidard Kleeman; 4/4/24California and Hawaii are pioneering ways to expand access. ... California is one of the first states in the country to require insurance companies that administer Medicaid benefits to fully cover palliative care services for eligible residents. ... Palliative care is poised to be a game changer for public health. Nearly 50 percent of states now include palliative care services for eligible Medicaid recipients, according to C-TAC. And in California and Hawaii, two paths are being forged toward wider palliative care access. ... 

Dana-Farber’s new push to integrate palliative, behavioral services in cancer careHospice News, by Audrie Martin; 4/2/24Boston-based Dana-Farber Cancer Institute has launched the Neuro-Inclusive Oncology Care and Empowerment Program, a psychosocial oncology initiative focused on adults with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities (IDD). ... Patients with disabilities are largely underserved, but they represent a growing need as well as an untapped market for providers. More palliative care and hospice companies are developing programs to meet the specific concerns of these patients to improve access to care.

Blue Shield's Palliative Care Program wins national recognition for improving lives Blue Shield California; 3/28/24 During the first quarter of this year, the Journal of Palliative Medicine published results of a study entitled “Cost and Utilization Implications of a Health Plan’s Home-Based Palliative Care Program” from leaders at Blue Shield and researchers from West Health Research Institute that garnered attention from industry publications. ...  Major findings from the study were that home-based palliative care delivered to people not yet eligible for hospice reduced their hospital and emergency room use, showed trends towards an increased length of life, and extended the continuum of care for people with serious illness and their caregivers.

How home-based care providers are leveraging palliative care in hospital partnerships Home Health Care News, by Patrick Filbin; 3/26/24 Oftentimes, talks between home health providers and their many referral partners are an exercise in education. For providers offering palliative care, that education usually starts at a 101-level. Part of that conversation with hospital and health system partners includes convincing case managers that patients will be better suited at home. Editor's Note: Features Choice Health at Home CEO David Jackson; Kaiser Permanente Senior Director of Care Hospice and Palliative Care Gina Andres

Palliative care in the older adult with cancer and the role of the geriatrician: a narrative review Annals of Palliative Medicine, by Bibban Bant Deol, Lisa Binns-Emerick, MOhammad Kang, Pragnesh Patel; 3/15/24 online ahead of print Conclusions: Embedding primary care geriatrics in the palliative care arena helps to provide more access to this care. This integration helps providers address basic symptom management, advance care planning and work with individuals on goals of care to assure the care being provided is congruent individual's priorities. Older adults respond to symptoms different than their younger counterparts. Management of these symptoms has to be addressed in a manner commiserate with their age.

Palliative Care Movement achieves significant progress in California California Health Care Foundation, by Claudia Boyd-Barrett; 3/19/24 ... Palliative care has taken root in California over the past 15 years, driven by hundreds of leaders within health plans, hospitals, clinics, home care agencies, advocacy and education organizations, and state government. ... Some of California’s greatest palliative care progress has been accomplished in programs serving people at the lowest income levels through the state’s Medi-Cal program and through public health care systems.

Palliative Care as ‘Personalized Medicine’Hospice News, by Jim Parker; 3/18/24The term “personalized medicine” is often used to describe health needs based on a patient’s genetics. However, more stakeholders are applying the term to palliative care. Personalized medicine is a step away from a “one-size-fits-all” approach to health care. The model uses information gathered from a patient’s genome to plan for care, treatment and services, and to some extent, predict a likely health trajectory, according to the National Human Genome Research Institute, part of the National Institutes of Health.

Palliative Care integration on the rise Hospice News, by Jim Parker; 3/13/24A range of medical specialties are incorporating palliative care principles into their care models. The trend points to ways that patients might receive palliative services through new avenues, such as geriatrics, primary care or home health care. 

Telehealth preferences among patients with advanced cancer in the post COVID-19 vaccine eraJournal of Pain and Symptom Management; by Kawoswi K Shih, MD; Adrienne B Arechiga; Xi Chen PhD; Diana L. Urbauer, MS; Aline Rozman De Moraes, MD; Ashley J Rodriquez; Lisa Thomas; Penny A Stanton; Eduardo Bruera, MD; and David Hui MD; 3/10/24 Background: Few studies have examined patient preferences for telehealth in palliative care after the availability of COVID-19 vaccines. We examined patient preferences for video versus in-person visits and factors contributing to preferences in the post-vaccine era. Conclusion: Patients expressed strong preference for video over in-person visits in the outpatient palliative care setting.

NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue opens new Palliative Care Serenity Unit for patients and families NYC Health+Hospitals Press Release; 3/7/24 NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue today announced the opening of a new Palliative Care Serenity Unit for patients and families. ... “We created the Serenity Unit because we noted an increasing number of patients either spending their dying days at the hospital or in need of extra support and symptom management expertise that palliative care provides,” said Susan E. Cohen, MD, director of the Palliative Care Program at NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue. “We want to ensure that patients who are here in their final days are being treated with dignity and expertise.”Editor's Note: NYC Health + Hospitals/Bellevue is the oldest hospital in America, tracing their roots back to 1736 when a six-bed infirmary opened on the second floor of the New York City Almshouse.

Editorial: Illness trajectories in the age of big data The BMJ; by Peter Tanuseputro, Colleen Webber, and James Downar; 3/1/24For decades, healthcare providers have understood that patients follow typical trajectories of health decline as they approach the end of life, and they have used this understanding to help patients and families anticipate the dying process. Traditional trajectories focus on function or overall health status and include sudden death, terminal illness ..., organ failure ..., and frailty ... Two Education articles in the BMJ add novel dimensions to our understanding of health decline. Murray et al explain how declines in function do not always mirror declines in social, psychological, and spiritual dimensions. They also add a new trajectory, multimorbidity, to describe a person with conditions from multiple trajectories (such as heart disease from organ failure and cognitive impairment from frailty).

The current state of community-based palliative careHospice News, by Jim Parker; 3/4/24“Palliative care” is becoming a buzz word in health care, even if many people don’t understand the loosely defined term. However, wide variation exists in how different providers deliver these services in the absence of a standardized, national definition or a more concrete regulatory structure that includes quality measures, Logan Hoover, vice president of policy and public relations for the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO), said at the Hospice News Palliative Care Conference in Tampa, Florida.

Palliative care gets spotlight in assisted dying report Nursing Times, by Edd Church; 3/1/24A debate around assisted dying has brought hospices into the spotlight, as a new report on the matter has been published.