Palliative Care - Comparison With Hospice Care

Comparison With Hospice Care

In the United States, a distinction may be made between palliative care and hospice care. Hospice services and palliative care programs share similar goals of providing symptom relief and pain management. Palliative care services can be offered to any patient without restriction to disease or prognosis, and can be appropriate for anyone with a serious, complex illness, whether they are expected to recover fully, to live with chronic illness for an extended time, or to experience disease progression. Hospice care under the Medicare Hospice Benefit, however, requires that two physicians certify that a patient has less than six months to live if the disease follows its usual course. This does not mean, though, that if a patient is still living after six months in hospice he or she will be discharged from the service.

The philosophy and multi-disciplinary team approach are similar with hospice and palliative care, and indeed the training programs and many organizations provide both. The biggest difference between hospice and palliative care is the patient: where they are in their illness especially related to prognosis and their goals/wishes regarding curative treatment.

Outside the United States there is generally no such division of terminology or funding, and all such care with a primarily palliative focus, whether or not for patients with terminal illness, is usually referred to as palliative care, without restriction.

Outside the United States the term hospice usually refers to a building or institution which specialises in palliative care, rather than to a particular stage of care progression. Such institutions may predominantly specialise in providing care in an end-of-life setting; but they may also be available for patients with other specific palliative care needs.