Pushing Palliative Care

The July issue of Health Affairs, a leading health policy journal, is devoted to “advanced illness and end-of-life care.” While most of the articles focus on people who are dying, or at least who are likely to die in a matter of months, a few shining exceptions endorse a broader view. The center piece of this effort, and arguably of the entire issue, is the call to action by several palliative care luminaries and two senior figures from prominent foundations. This distinguished group of health care professionals put forward an idea at once radical and conventional: a national strategy for palliative care, to be spearheaded by the federal government (based in the Department of Health and Human Services) and grounded in a public-private partnership involving payers, regulators, and foundations.

The idea is radical because it would put palliative care, a field only established in the United States in the 1990s, at the forefront of care for the majority of America’s sickest, neediest, most vulnerable—and most costly—patients. It is conventional because it follows the model of earlier bipartisan initiatives that influenced the health care system, such as the Office of National AIDS policy. And it is conventional because it continues the tradition of specialist care established in the US after World War II, an approach to medicine that is uniquely American—and at the heart of what makes our system expensive, inefficient, and out of touch with the needs of sick patients.

Don’t get me wrong—there is much to like and admire about this proposal. It rests on the assumption that the essence of palliative care, an emphasis on symptom management, advance care planning (or as the authors put it, communication about goals and preferences), and psychosocial support to patients and families, is exactly what people with serious illness and functional impairment need. I agree. It endorses the view that this approach to medical care is best delivered by a team of health care professionals. I agree, although I would add family caregivers to the team. And it assumes that the best way to move forward is to expand palliative care expertise (through research, workforce training, and caregiver education), establish standards of care, and assure access—which will require oversight, regulation, and financial support. I’m not sure this is the only way forward, but it is probably the most expeditious way to proceed and parallels the successful models introduced in New Zealand and Australia. It’s the specialist part of the proposal that makes me uneasy.

The authors define palliative care as a “team-based specialty focusing on improving quality of life and relieving suffering,” though they acknowledge that “primary-  or generalist-level palliative care” is another variant, one that “integrates palliative care elements into the care provided by all clinicians serving the seriously ill.” Implicitly, they hew to the old, and I would argue antiquated, distinction between “curing” and “caring.” Standard medicine, in this view, is about curing; palliative medicine is about caring. But in today’s world, where most, although not all, diseases are chronic, cure is seldom what usual treatment is about. Physicians cannot cure diabetes or congestive heart failure, they cannot cure endstage kidney disease or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, nor can they cure Alzheimer’s disease or many cancers. There are, to be sure, some diseases that can truly be cured, principally infectious ones, but also some cancers and surgical problems. But for the vast majority of serious conditions that afflict adults today, all treatment is palliative. Modern medicine may prolong life, but above all, it lightens the burden of disease, thereby improving quality of life.

Now, if most of today’s serious illnesses are chronic, and most of contemporary medical treatment is inherently palliative, then why limit treatment to palliative care specialists? Surely all physicians who provide care for conditions such as congestive heart failure or COPD should be palliatricized. Only in particularly challenging cases would palliative care specialists be called in. Just as most cases of high blood pressure and heart failure are treated by internists, not cardiologists, but heart specialists have a role in refractory or tricky cases, just as most cases of depression and anxiety are treated by generalists, not psychiatrists, but mental health clinicians have a role in a subset of specially complicated cases, so too should non-palliative care specialists take the lead in caring for most patients today.

American medicine is at a crossroads. We could expand specialty care further by growing the field of palliative care. This is certainly the approach we have taken since World War II to dealing with burgeoning medical knowledge. It’s part of why American medicine is so much more expensive and inefficient than medicine in other developed nations. It is precisely the reaction against highly specialized care that resulted in the kind of person-centered care that is at the heart of palliative care. It is probably the easier path—easier than trying to educate internists, cardiologists, neurologists, oncologists and all other physicians who provide care to patients with advanced illness. Or we could re-conceptualize much of modern medicine as palliative and get rid of the false dichotomy between curative care and comfort care. The century is still young. Let’s get this right.

Life in the End Zone will be on vacation until August 13.

        

           

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