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End-of-life care can be broadly defined as health care provided to persons who are very ill, have a prognosis that is likely to worsen, and most likely will die in the near term from their illness. End- of-life care may be in the form of acute care provided in the days or months prior to death or palliative care, which focuses on relieving the patient's suffering and reducing the severity of disease symptoms as well as improving quality of life. Hospice care is a form of palliative care that delivers comfort care to those who forgo curative treatment and have a life expectancy that can be measured in months. Achieving a health care system where the provision of end-of-life care services are sensitive to and accommodate the needs of all those involved requires attention to a range of ethical and policy issues, including personal choice, cost, and quality of care. Over the past century, several demographic and historical changes have affected the experience of death and dying in the United States. The development of new technologies, and the associated prospect of longer, more protracted deaths, has focused some policy discussions on the topic of patients' preferences. Federal law generally defers ...