The Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) was among only four national nonprofit organizations selected to address an audience of leading philanthropic funders and advisors at the 2014 Conference on Scaling Impact, organized by the Social Impact Exchange (SIE). At the Scaling in Action© session, CAPC’s director, Diane Meier, MD, discussed the organization’s palliative care model and growth strategy for expanding palliative care into the community.

Invited organizations were chosen by the SIE’s Health Working Group comprised of advisors from The Atlantic Philanthropies; California HealthCare Foundation; The Commonwealth Fund; The Fan Fox and Leslie R. Samuels Foundation, Inc.; The John A. Hartford Foundation; Kaiser Permanente; The Leona M. and Harry B. Helmsley Charitable Trust; The Pew Charitable Trusts; Robert Wood Johnson Foundation; and W.K. Kellogg Foundation; among several other notable national philanthropic organizations. The decisions were based on the organizations whose work the Health Working Group deemed as highly impactful in addressing critical social issues.

The need for palliative care is great. Approximately 90 million Americans are living with serious and life-threatening illnesses, including heart disease, diabetes, cancer, Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease. That number is expected to more than double over the next 25 years. This is the palliative care patient population -- those with the greatest quality-of-life challenges from their illness, and those forced to rely on hospitals, emergency rooms and intensive care units when their needs are not met at home.

Though the seriously ill and those with multiple chronic conditions constitute about 10% of all patients in the U.S., they account for more than 50% of the nation's health care costs. Studies have shown that palliative care improves the quality of care and quality of life, prolong life and markedly reduce the need for costly hospitalizations.

“CAPC is truly a pioneer in the effort to build and advance the field of palliative care, an urgent health care issue in the U.S.,” says Alexander Rossides, co-founder and CEO of the Social Impact Exchange and the Growth Philanthropy Network. “They are one of a very select group of nonprofit initiatives chosen to launch the Scaling Marketplace, a place where funders who care about social impact can identify and support high impact solutions that are going to scale.”

“The thrust of our growth strategy is to increase access to high-quality palliative care in community-based settings – for now 25 health systems and accountable care organizations nationwide -- by 2017,” says Meier. “Community-based palliative care programs are key to curtailing the cycling in and out of the hospital that many seriously ill people endure. This can help alleviate the enormous strain on health care resources and the enormous physical, emotional and financial strain on families.”

The plan is for CAPC to build on its successful hospital model and apply it to where most of the need for palliative care is unmet – in the community. Reaching patients when they need it and where they need it – in their homes, nursing homes, office practices and cancer centers − in order to ensure that high quality services are accessible throughout the continuum of care.

“Health system and community health leaders are turning to us for proven, efficient implementation of community-based palliative care initiatives,” adds Meier. “This depends on an effective growth strategy, one that supports capacity building and ensures sustainability. We are grateful for the platform SIE has provided and the philanthropic brain trust to help guide our scaling efforts.”

“Our process for screening initiatives is quite rigorous, and we set an especially high bar when it comes to documenting impact and demonstrating a viable business model,” says Rossides. “Building on the growing body of evidence and their unmatched expertise, Diane Meier and her team created a robust business plan that places the vision of fully integrated palliative care well within reach, ultimately benefiting millions of patients and their families. The Social Impact Exchange is honored to include CAPC among the inaugural cohort of initiatives being taken to market through the Scaling Marketplace.”

SIE’s Annual Social Impact Exchange Conference brings together funders, advisors and nonprofit leaders to share knowledge, learn about innovative co-funding opportunities and develop a community to help scale top initiatives.

About the Center to Advance Palliative Care

The Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) provides health care professionals with the tools, training and technical assistance necessary to start and sustain successful palliative care programs in hospitals and other health care settings. Located at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai in New York City, CAPC is a national organization dedicated to increasing the availability of quality palliative care services for people facing serious, complex illness. To learn more visit, http://www.capc.org/ and http://getpalliativecare.org and follow on Twitter: @CAPCpalliative

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For more information, please contact Dan Altano, communications manager, at 212-201-2678 or [email protected].

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