Wide disparities found in late-stage cancer care

[struggle4progress]

By Rob Stein
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 16, 2010; 9:59 PM

The proportion of cancer patients who die in the hospital and who get hospice care varies widely from region to region and hospital to hospital across the country, according to a new report.

Researchers at the Dartmouth Atlas Project in Lebanon, N.H., analyzed the records of 235,821 Medicare patients ages 65 and older who died between 2003 and 2007. Overall, the researchers found that one-third of patients spent their last days in hospitals and intensive-care units. But there was a big range. At one end was Manhattan, where 46.7 percent died in the hospital. In contrast, only 7 percent of cancer patients died in the hospital in Mason City, Iowa.

Washington fell in the middle, with about a third of patients dying in the hospital ...

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/16/AR2010111607260.html

[hedgehog]

1. Another article addressing this topic:

http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2010/08/02/100802fa_fact_gawande


It's a subject well worth thinking through.