Palliative Care - 1996 and 2010

More than 13 years ago, Philadephia Inquirer reporter Michael Vitez wrote a series about end-of-life care which won a Pulitzer Prize - see here for the first installment of that five-part series.

Some excerpts from that piece:

"Medicine has gotten so good at keeping people alive that Americans increasingly must decide how and when they will die. They must choose if death will come in a hospital room with beeping machines and blinking monitors or if it will come at home, with hospice workers blunting the fear and pain that so often accompany the final hours."
"The intensive-care unit offers a hope for recovery, but the price can be a miserable death. Deciding when to surrender can be a torture all its own."
"Advocates for change believe doctors are too optimistic, too sparing in what they tell patients. They say that families would be more willing to accept death earlier if doctors were more honest, more realistic. Reformers want to make sure that patients get the care they need, but not unnecessary or unwanted treatment. The key to humane and cost-effective intensive care is to treat those who will benefit, but not squander precious resources and impose futile treatments on those who will not. But often it is impossible to know who will live and who won't."

In today's Philadelphia Inquirer appears an article by Michael Vitez (read here), as part one of an occasional series on the dilemmas facing today's hospitals. The subject is how hospitals are addressing end-of-care issues, and in his article Mr. Vitez follows the work of the palliative care team, led by palliative medicine physician Dr. Diane Dietzen, at Abington Memorial Hospital, a large, suburban Philadelphia hospital. An insightful article, one that lays out in very personal stories the challenges faced by families and providers alike. In Mr. Vitez' words: "My goal is to spend a year at Abington, writing stories that show how one hospital deals with the biggest issues in health care today and also the changes that are coming fast and furious - regardless of what Congress and the President do - to hospitals and health care.
This first story looks at how the palliative care movement is medicine's response to the dismal way people have died. I try to show, up close, how the team works, the agony that families feel, the immense costs involved. "

Has much changed around end-of-life care in those 13 years? Surely, a patient in an ICU with a poor prognosis is more likely today than 1996 to be consulted by a palliative medicine physician such as Dr. Dietzen. But how much more likely, and if a consult is requested, is the timing appropriate? Just as surely, large variations in late-life care continue to persist among hospitals and communities, still raising questions about the appropriate role for acute hospital care in the management of patients with advanced illnesses.

As one of the doctors in the 1997 article stated ," America wants to offer the most advanced technology and treatments to everyone, yet keep health-care costs down."
How to balance those desires, the doctor added, "is a discussion nobody wants to have." Thirteen years later, when one considers the discussions taking place in the name of health reform, one must wonder how far have we advanced.

The Unofficial Role of a Community Chief Palliative Care Officer

In a recent post (see here) I commented on the exemplary performance of Susquehanna Health System (in Williamsport, Pa.) in its end-of-life care practices, according to the DAI Palliative Care Group Hospital Performance Profile. In researching communities and health systems whose palliative practices have earned them an A grade, we're finding several common attributes. One of these attributes is the presence (usually unofficial or sometimes formalized) of a chief palliative care officer. Below are excerpts of an interview with Alexander Nesbitt, MD, chief of palliative care and hospice for the Susquehanna Health System, which appeared in a recent issue of HPM Practitioner.

Dr. Alexander Nesbitt was an established family practice physician and very part-time hospice medical director in Williamsport, PA, when he heard a 2003 presentation by Dr. Diane Meier, director of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC). "I had never heard of palliative care, but I became convinced that it was a really good idea, and that somebody in Williamsport should do it." He attended the Program in Palliative Care Education & Practice at Harvard Medical School (www.hms.harvard.edu/Pallcare/PCEP.htm) and began working toward board certification in HPM, earning that credential in 2004. He pursued an expanded role in Susquehanna Hospice and started advocating for a palliative care consultation service at 180-bed Williamsport Hospital & Medical Center. Both belong to the local Susquehanna Health System."The idea of starting a new program, which included hiring a full-time nurse practitioner to staff it, was an uphill push. I had to convince the hospital's administration that we should spend the money, even though the system was undergoing financial difficulties. Fortunately, CAPC has highly practical tools to use, well adapted to just that purpose." Dr. Nesbitt is an employee of the health system, which employs about half of the physicians in its region. "I had been working with administrators every step of the way, persuading them of the importance of this work - for patients and families, as well as for the system - and sharing outcomes data." When it came time to transfer full-time to hospice and palliative care, the various responsible parties were ready to sign off on the change. Dr. Nesbitt's salary is based in part on billing income from palliative care and inpatient hospice consultations, annualized, as well as an hourly rate for dedicated administrative responsibilities, which amount to nearly half of his roughly 50-hour week. "Although initially I wasn't so sure, I felt I could set it up piece by piece, and make a job of it," with the combination of hospice and palliative care a good package for the system, he says. "There's increasing information out there that this work is beneficial for the patient and family, for the reputation of the hospital, for customer satisfaction, for the bottom line, and for readmission rates."
In the beginning, Dr. Nesbitt took the lead on hospital palliative care consults, but as the program established its credibility, the nurse practitioner now makes over half of the visits. Another palliative care physician joined the team in 2007 and sees patients in affiliated, rural Muncy Valley Hospital, 10 miles away, and in the region's nine long-term care facilities. In addition to the hospital-based nurse practitioner, there is a second nurse practitioner based in the nursing homes, and an advanced practice nurse who sees patients in nursing homes and coordinates professional education events."Within the (HPM) team, each of us has a primary base, but we also work to float extra team time to wherever it is needed," he explains. The five members meet monthly to discuss practice issues. Growing demand for services is a problem, and the team tried to manage growth in sustainable ways while it extended services into the long-term care setting. Recently, it was decided to limit weekend palliative care consults to emergency cases only. "Sometimes we're really busy on the weekends, so we're working to make that part of this work more manageable," Dr. Nesbitt says. Dr. Nesbitt starts a typical workday by rounding on patients in the inpatient hospice unit, and then, depending on demand for palliative care that day, goes to the hospital. He makes occasional home visits to hospice patients and sees some patients in his office in the medical building. So far there is no formalized outpatient clinic setting or schedule for palliative care, although that may change in the next year, perhaps in conjunction with the system's Cancer Center. Dr. Nesbitt takes night and weekend call every third week, and he also meets regularly with various administrators within the health system's organizational chart. He spearheaded a POLST (physician orders for life-sustaining treatment) initiative in the region, working with the hospitals and nursing homes. The State of Pennsylvania does not give legal recognition to POLST, but a study group is working toward initiating a statewide form. He also chairs the hospital's ethics committee.

Surely, there are many factors contributing to the success of health systems and communities in their provision of late-life care to their patients and residents. I don't mean to ovrsimplify, but it's becoming apparent to us that the role of full-time HPM physicians is one of those influences.
I'm interested to learn of similar examples. Or, am I exaggerating the influence of HPM physician practices?