Effectiveness and cost-effectiveness of home palliative care services for adults with advanced illness and their caregivers

Abstract

The results provide clear and reliable evidence that home palliative care increases the chance of dying at home and reduces symptom burden in particular for patients with cancer, without impacting on caregiver grief. This justifies providing home palliative care for patients who wish to die at home. More work is needed to study cost-effectiveness especially for people with non-malignant conditions, assessing place of death and appropriate outcomes that are sensitive to change and valid in these populations, and to compare different models of home palliative care, in powered studies.

Effects of patient and personal demographic, clinical and psychosocial characteristics on the burden of family members caring for patients with advanced cancer in Greece

“…Both hospital and home palliative care services have been shown to significantly improve patient outcomes and caregiver satisfaction with care (Gomes et al, 2013;Higginson and Evans, 2010). By being present and by actively engaging in caregiver support, the multidisciplinary team can make a significant difference in caregivers' lives (Northfield and Nebauer, 2010).…”

Effectiveness of complex interventions focused on quality-of-life assessment to improve palliative care patients’ outcomes: A systematic review

“…16 Lately, some systematic reviews reported that PC has been proven to be more effective than standard approaches. [17][18][19] Conversely, little is known about the effectiveness of interventions focused on QoL measurement in PC clinical settings. Starting from the definition of complex interventions proposed by the Medical Research Council (MRC), 20 we lately argued that a procedure of QoL assessment in clinical practice (i.e.…”

Native American Death Taboo: Implications for Health Care Providers

“…Of course, yes, as long as it is developed with cultural sensitivity. [1][2][3][4] It is a community movement.…”

“…Its compassionate multidisciplinary team approach has proved effective physically, emotionally, and financially to alleviate pain and suffering and to further offer holistic comfort care to the recipients and their families. [1][2][3][4] Its growth has been gradual but steady, from only 1 facility in 1974 to 5800 facilities in 2013 in the United States. 5 Hospice care facilities served on 44.6% of all deaths in the United States.…”