The Design and Implementation of a Physician-Staffed, Referral-Based Advance Directive Clinic at an Academic Medical Center

The utilization and cost of critical care in the United States is rapidly growing (1). Evidence suggests that many patients receive unwanted medical treatments near the end of life, and clinical momentum in the intensive care unit may preclude patients from receiving their preferred plan of care (2). Some have proposed that improving the completion rate and availability of advance directives (ADs) may slow the momentum towards inappropriate, aggressive treatments at the end of life (3). At Loyola University Medical Center, only 17% of patients expiring in an ICU have an AD on file.

https://ift.tt/2uar4Sk