Years of life lost: A call to achieve equitable end-of-life care among children

Author:

Jawed Aysha1ORCID

Affiliation:

1. Department of Pediatric and OB/GYN Social Work, Johns Hopkins Children’s Center, Baltimore, MD, USA

Abstract

Significant disparities continue to exist in access to inpatient pediatric hospice care among children at the end-of-life. Increasingly more children at this stage are dying in the hospital or at home on hospice which is not always an acceptable option to the children and their families. Two clinical case examples illustrate implementation of these options in practice. A missing link exists in healthcare systems across developed and developing countries in pediatric end-of-life care. Currently, the primary options involve selecting between hospital and home-based hospice care. Proposing to increase access to inpatient pediatric hospice services could potentially increase acceptability of this option to honor the child in line with the family’s preferences, goals, wishes, and values. In addition, inpatient pediatric hospice could offset costs from preventable hospitalizations and overall high-cost healthcare utilization. Oftentimes, readmissions impact decision-making among caregivers that include changes in code status from Do Not Resuscitate/Do Not Intubate (DNR/DNI) to full curative care, thereby resulting in medicalization or overmedicalization of the child. It follows that reduced healthcare expenditures will increase cost efficiency across the healthcare system. Achieving health equity in palliative care among adult and pediatric patients at the end-of-life is a longstanding goal of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF). Proposing to mitigate disparities in palliative care among children through inpatient hospice as another viable option for their families could contribute to the larger overarching goal of achieving health equity in end-of-life care across the world.

Publisher

Maad Rayan Publishing Company

Subject

Public Health, Environmental and Occupational Health,Education,Health (social science)

Reference19 articles.

1. Pediatric hospice program for young patients. Gilchrist website. Available from: https://gilchristcares.org/services/hospice-care/do-i-need-hospice/gilchrist-kids/. Accessed November 19, 2022.

2. Friebert SE, Williams C. National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization’s facts and figures: Pediatric Palliative and Hospice Care in America. Available from: https://www.nhpco.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Pediatric_Facts-Figures-1.pdf. Accessed December 4, 2022.

3. Provision of Palliative and Hospice Care to Children in the Community: A Population Study of Hospice Nurses

4. Committee on Approaching Death: Addressing Key End of Life Issues; Institute of Medicine. Dying in America: Improving Quality and Honoring Individual Preferences Near the End of Life. Washington, DC: National Academies Press (US); 2015. Appendix F, Pediatric End-of-Life and Palliative Care: Epidemiology and Health Service Use. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK285690/.

5. National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (U.S.), & Center to Advance Palliative Care. 2001. Hospital-Hospice Partnerships in Palliative Care: Creating a Continuum of Service. Available from: http://www.capc.org/palliative-care-across-the-continuum/Hospital-Hospice-Partnerships.pdf. Accessed January 11, 2023.

Cited by 1 articles. 订阅此论文施引文献 订阅此论文施引文献,注册后可以免费订阅5篇论文的施引文献,订阅后可以查看论文全部施引文献

同舟云学术

1.学者识别学者识别

2.学术分析学术分析

3.人才评估人才评估

"同舟云学术"是以全球学者为主线,采集、加工和组织学术论文而形成的新型学术文献查询和分析系统,可以对全球学者进行文献检索和人才价值评估。用户可以通过关注某些学科领域的顶尖人物而持续追踪该领域的学科进展和研究前沿。经过近期的数据扩容,当前同舟云学术共收录了国内外主流学术期刊6万余种,收集的期刊论文及会议论文总量共计约1.5亿篇,并以每天添加12000余篇中外论文的速度递增。我们也可以为用户提供个性化、定制化的学者数据。欢迎来电咨询!咨询电话:010-8811{复制后删除}0370

www.globalauthorid.com

TOP

Copyright © 2019-2024 北京同舟云网络信息技术有限公司
京公网安备11010802033243号  京ICP备18003416号-3