End of Life Care
In an ideal system, the goals of health care would change as individuals neared the end of their lives. The aim of care should shift to encompass comfort rather than just cure and the recipient of care should include the family in addition to the patient.
Unfortunately both our attitudes towards death and our health care payment system conspire to make the last year of life too often filled with needless physical and emotional pain, as well as ineffective and costly treatments.
Partners in Care is engaged in groundbreaking work to break down the many barriers to quality care towards the end of life.
Our proudest achievements have been in the area of palliative care.
In partnership with Kaiser Permanente, the Partners Institute for Change Research Center has found evidence that instilling hospice-like practice standards such as pain and symptom management and family-centered care without requiring that the patient give up all efforts at cure produces better patient outcomes as well as cost savings.
Kaiser has now extended this palliative care program beyond the pilot site to many of their centers throughout the country. The California HealthCare Foundation has now funded Partners to test the effectiveness of palliative care models outside of Kaiser’s” closed" system, which encompasses all costs and savings as well as accountability and decision making.
Hospice Legacy
In 2005, working through Partners' affiliate at that time, Hospice of Pasadena (recently renamed Hospice Legacy), a partnership with Huntington Hospital, funded by the UniHealth Foundation, brought a complete end-of-life curriculum to physicians and other hospital staff, as well as a unique outreach program to improve support for recently bereaved families.
San Gabriel End-of-Life Coalition
Partners in Care is also a founding member of the San Gabriel Valley End-of-Life Care Coalition, which works to educate the public and professionals about issues such as pain management, coping with grief, and advance directives.
