The specialist palliative care team as a local resource

Specialist-level palliative care support is intended for patients with complex physical and psychosocial needs. In addition to direct clinical care, specialist teams can be utilized to support the delivery of community-based palliative care by providing 24/7 access to advice and support for primary care providers, patients, and their families.

This paper describes how a specialist palliative care team, based in a tertiary level hospital, can provide timely access to palliative care for patients in a surrounding sub-region that has historically lacked a robust network of community-based palliative care supports.

A retrospective database analysis was conducted from January 1 - December 31, 2019, to describe the demographic and clinical characteristics of patients referred to the Palliative Care Consult Team who reside in the sub-region of Scarborough, Ontario. Data were reviewed to highlight the role the team plays in supporting end-of-life care for this community of patients, families, and providers. Patients referred to the Palliative Care Consult Team with a residential address within the sub-region of interest were the focus.

In total, 343 patients living in the selected sub-region were seen by the Palliative Care Consult Team during a 12-month period, representing 18% of the team's annual clinical volume. The majority of these patients (94%) had a cancer diagnosis. Median Palliative Performance Scale score at time of initial consult was 40 for inpatients and 60 for ambulatory patients. More than half the patients (56%) were "full code" at the time of initial palliative care consultation. Median survival from initial consult to death was 18 days for inpatients and 68 days for ambulatory patients. More than half of the patients (54%) died in a palliative care unit, with a smaller percentage dying in the home setting (7%).

Our report highlights the utilization of a database as a quality improvement tool to illustrate our institution's palliative care mission and vision of engaging in the provision of palliative care expertise to community-based patients and healthcare colleagues.