Palliative Care Saves Your Hospital Money

Hospitals saved more than $3,200 per patient over the course of a hospital stay when palliative care was added to their routine care.

Palliative care programs that aggressively treat pain and improve care coordination result in shorter hospital stays and lower costs, particularly for the sickest patients, according to a meta-analysis this week in JAMA Internal Medicine.

A study by Mount Sinai and Trinity College in Dublin, Ireland, pooled data from six prior studies involving more than 130,000 adults admitted to hospitals in the United States between 2001 and 2015. Of these patients, 3.6% received a palliative care consultation in addition to their other hospital care.

The study found:

• Hospitals saved on average $3,237 per patient, over the course of a hospital stay, when palliative care was added to their routine care as compared to those who didn't receive palliative care.
   
• Palliative care was associated with a cost savings—per hospital stay—of $4,251 per patient with cancer and $2,105 for those with non-cancer diagnoses.
   
• Savings were greatest for patients with the highest number of co-existing illnesses.

"People with serious and complex medical illness account heavily for healthcare spending, yet often experience poor outcomes," says the lead study author Peter May, MD, research fellow in health economics with the Centre for Health Policy and Management at Trinity College Dublin.

"The news that palliative care can significantly improve patient experience by reducing unnecessary, unwanted, and burdensome procedures, while ensuring that patients are cared for in the setting of their choice, is highly encouraging," May says. "It suggests that we can improve outcomes and curb costs even for those with serious illness."

The researchers found that the association of palliative care with less intense hospital treatment was most pronounced among those patients with a primary diagnosis of cancer than for those with a non-cancer diagnosis, and for individuals with four or more comorbidities compared with those with two or fewer.

"The potential to reduce the suffering of millions of Americans is enormous," says study co-author R. Sean Morrison, MD, with the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. "This study proves that better care can go hand in hand with a better bottom line."