Prevalence and correlates of advance care planning among Australian hospital inpatients

Abstract

The prevalence and factors associated with advance care planning (ACP) documents for Australian public hospital inpatients were determined through cross‐sectional study of 123 Victorian hospitals between July 2016 and December 2018. Of the 611 786 included patients, 2.9% had an ACP document. Odds increased significantly in those comorbid, unpartnered, regional and >5 admissions, which supports future ACP conversations and document creation.

Does advance care planning have a future?

“…Drawing on a large database in the State of Victoria, where in 2015 an Act of Parliament established a clear framework for advance directives and decision-making hierarchies, it shows that in a large, diverse population of patients attending public hospitals over a period of two and a half years, fewer than 3% had completed an ACP and, in the group 65 years and younger, fewer than 1%. 16 Do these findings mean that the ACP bubble has finally burst? Do they imply that we should turn our attention to other ways to enhance care in serious illness and at the end of life?…”

“…in this issue of the Internal Medicine Journal is consistent with these findings and arguably more definitive than most previous attempts to estimate the uptake of ACP. Drawing on a large database in the State of Victoria, where in 2015 an Act of Parliament established a clear framework for advance directives and decision‐making hierarchies, it shows that in a large, diverse population of patients attending public hospitals over a period of two and a half years, fewer than 3% had completed an ACP and, in the group 65 years and younger, fewer than 1% 16 …”