Patient-centered advance care planning in special patient populations: a pilot study

The purpose of this study was to assess the feasibility of a patient-centered advance care planning (PC-ACP) approach to patients with chronic illnesses and their surrogates with respect to promotion of shared decision-making outcomes-congruence between patient and surrogate, patient's decisional conflict, and knowledge of advance care planning. An experimental design was used. The settings were the heart failure, renal dialysis, and cardiovascular surgery clinics at Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center in La Crosse, WI. Twenty-seven patient-surrogate pairs participated. A 1-hour PC-ACP interview was provided to the experimental group. Only usual care was delivered to participants in the control group. Comparison of the composite scores of a Statement of Treatment Preferences indicated that congruence in decision-making for future medical treatment in patient-surrogate pairs in the treatment group was significantly higher than in the control group. Greater satisfaction with the decision-making process and less decisional conflict were demonstrated in the treatment group. The PC-ACP interview can be effective in promoting shared decision-making between patients and their surrogates and in producing greater satisfaction with the process of decision-making and less decisional conflict.