Resources in This Guide
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About This Guide
“Palliative care is the best friend of the seriously ill. I say that as a person diagnosed more than 10 years ago with stage IV inflammatory breast cancer, a rare and particularly deadly form. In addition to the care I receive from my oncologist, I get an extra layer of support from my palliative care team. They help me manage my pain and symptoms, not just manage the cancer. I have never been hospitalized for cancer in these past 10 years because of the support I have received. That’s a big deal for me and my family, and it’s a big deal from a societal perspective with lower cost of care and better health outcomes. Palliative care is the ultimate win-win.”
– Amy Berman, Senior Program Officer, The John A. Hartford Foundation
For individuals living with complex, often chronic, conditions, and their families, palliative care can provide relief from symptoms, improve satisfaction and outcomes, and help address critical needs during difficult times. There is growing recognition of the importance of palliative care services for individuals with serious illness, such as pain and symptom management, care coordination, advance care planning, and team-based, multi-disciplinary assessment and care planning. These services can help patients and families cope with the symptoms and stressors of disease, better anticipate and avoid crises, and reduce unnecessary or unwanted care. While this model is grounded in evidence that demonstrates improved quality of life, better outcomes, and reduced cost for patients, only a fraction of individuals who could benefit from palliative care receive it. This resource guide offers state officials tools and examples to increase access to palliative care in their state.
The strategies are organized into subsections that can be read as stand-alone resources as well as part of the overarching document. The sections are:
- Connecting patients to palliative care
- Supporting a palliative care workforce
- Paying for palliative care
Each section is comprised of state vignettes that exemplify many of the policy options available to states to address the topic under examination. Each vignette includes links to further information about the approach, including legislation, guidance the state gave to plans and providers, and payment policies. Finally, at the end of each section we provide links to relevant NASHP resources, as well as selected resources produced by other organizations.
“Palliative care isn’t just an idea, it’s personal. As a two-time cancer survivor, it was palliative care that took me off the medical conveyor belt and into a personalized care pathway. It was with a palliative care nurse that I was able to talk about what made sense for my life, my future. Asking for that palliative care consult gave me a completely new perspective, and a new dream: a dream to create a system that responds to my future needs and those of others.”
– Torrie Fields, Managing Partner, TF Analytics
NASHP provides resources and support for states to implement and expand high-quality palliative care. A complete list of NASHP resources on palliative care is available on our website. To get news and updates on state palliative care initiatives and resources, sign up for our quarterly newsletter.
Acknowledgements
The authors thank the state officials from Arizona, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Massachusetts, Tennessee, Texas, and Washington, as well as representatives of the Center to Advance Palliative Care for their review of a draft of this document. We also thank Scott Bane, our program officer at The John A. Hartford Foundation, for his review and guidance. Finally, we thank Wendy Fox-Grage, Hemi Tewarson, and the communications team at NASHP for their contributions to this resource guide.
This resource guide was made possible by a generous grant from The John A. Hartford Foundation.
The John A. Hartford Foundation
