A Pilot Study of a Palliative Care Service Embedded in a Hepatology Clinic at a Large Public Hospital

Carin van Zyl*, Aaron D. Storms, Welmoed van Deen, Valeria Cardenas, Robin Ellis, Alicia Flores, John Donovan, Lily Chu, Tanu Patel, Susan Enguidanos

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

Background: End-stage liver disease (ESLD) patients carry heavy symptom burdens and risk receiving aggressive and sometimes unwanted care at end of life. Palliative care (PC), which aims to alleviate symptoms and facilitate goal-concordant care in serious illness, may offer substantial benefits for ESLD patients but is not widely provided.Objectives: To assess the impact of PC integrated within hepatology (PCIH) services on health care utilization, advance care planning (ACP), and hospice enrollment.Design: We compared patients who received PCIH (n = 55) to a retrospective cohort (n = 57) receiving usual care in an outpatient hepatology clinic.Setting/Subjects: From June 2016 to November 2017, we enrolled patients receiving care in a U.S. public hospital clinic who met the following inclusion criteria: (1) ESLD with a Model for End-Stage Liver Disease score >= 20, (2) hepatology approval for PC referral, and (3) at least one advanced complication of ESLD.Measurements: We assessed patient demographics, clinical information, health care insurance status, health care utilization, completion of psychosocial assessments, and ACP using two-sided Fisher's exact test and Mann-Whitney U tests.Results: Patients receiving PCIH more frequently had goals of care discussions (87.3% vs. 21.2% p
Original languageEnglish
Number of pages8
JournalJournal of Palliative Medicine
Early online dateDec 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 26 Dec 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This study was funded by a grant from the California
Health Care Foundation, under grant no. 19511. Valeria
Cardenas is supported by the National Institute on Aging
of the National Institutes of Health under award number
T32AG000037.

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