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In Reply To: Re:In-patient Palliative Care Program
Next Reply: Re:Re:Re:In-patient Palliative Care Program

Post Re:Re:In-patient Palliative Care Program
Author: slmare
Date: Feb 28, 2008 3:31 pm
Tim;

Regarding your comment "making use of hospitalists already on staff" - has there been any successful hospitalist groups that specialize in Palliative Medicine. The reason I ask, is within our org. we have had a few hospitalists interested in joining our pall med service part time. What is your thought on the possibility of hospitalists having either their own palliative medicine physician within their group or maybe starting pall med hospitalist group (sorta like the upcoming "proceduralists, surgicalists, etc. etc.). May that be the wave of the future?
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+ Re:Re:Re:In-patient Palliative Care Program (by tcousounis on 02/28/2008)
While I can't be more specific, there are hospitalist groups that have an "exclusive" on inpatient palliative care in the hospitals with which they're affiliated. Whether they're successful, or can be considered palliative medicine specialists, depends on whom you ask. While data on this subject is hard to come by, piecing together disparate bits of information suggests that there are more than a hundred physicians presently working as hospitalists who are certified in palliative medicine. For me, as someone working to develop the discipline of palliative medicine and improve the opportunities for palliative medicine specialists, the question we need to address is not if hospitalists can be successful in palliative care (they can, they have been, and they will continue to be), but how can hospitalists and palliative medicine specialists best coexist? The case that hospitalists can make (and have been making) to hospital management about their ability to develop and sustain an inpatient consult program is in many ways a stronger statement (in the minds of hospital executives) than the ones advanced by palliative care specialists and hospice management. The wave of the future is likely to be hospitalists (certified in palliative medicine, or not) providing hospital-based palliative care under the terms of professional service contracts between the hospitals and hospitalist groups. Tim Cousounis MDVantage Palliative Care Group tcousounis@digital-action.com
Re:Re:Re:In-patient Palliative Care Program (by EvaChittenden on 03/01/2008)
A false distinction is being made between "certified palliative care experts" and hospitalists. At University of California, San Francisco, as at many hospitals across the country, there is a very successful palliative care service within our hospitalist group, staffed by hospitalists who are also "certified palliative care experts." The director, Dr. Steve Pantilat, is a national leader in Palliative Medicine, as well as past president of Society of Hospital Medicine. UCSF was chosen as a Palliative Care Leadership Center partly because of its hospitalist leadership model. We have trained numerous programs across the country, many led by PC-certified hospitalists. We also received the AHA Circle of Life award last year, mainly in recognition of our creation of this new hospitalist-led model of inpatient palliative care. Hospitalists who become trained and boarded in Palliative Medicine are in a unique position to deliver excellent care to seriously ill patients in hospitals. Given the incredible need for qualified palliative care physicians in this country, there is no need to create unnecessary competition between groups; there is more than enough work to go around! Eva Chittenden, MD; Assistant Director, UCSF Palliative Care Service; PCLC faculty.

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