Hospice Management Advisor Archives – May 1, 2010
May 1, 2010
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Brace for payment revisions under health care reform
This issue looks at what items are included in the Health Insurance Reform Bill signed into law and what industry experts anticipate the effect will be on hospice. As implementation decisions are made, Hospice Management Advisor will cover those changes and offer suggestions on how to remain successful -
CoPs: Just the beginning for most hospices
This is the first of a two-part series examining the impact of some regulatory and financial changes faced by hospices during recent years. This month's article looks at the increased need for technology to manage hospice billing and data collection. Next month we look at how agencies have met the challenge of physician notes in records, staff training, and management of increased administrative tasks -
Hospice-related Changes in Health Care Reform Law
Incorporates a productivity adjustment reduction into the market basket update beginning in fiscal year (FY) 2013, -
EOL video studied with cancer patients
The latest in a series of papers published by researchers led by Angelo Volandes, MD, MPH, instructor in medicine at Harvard Medical School and documentary filmmaker, looks at the use of a video showing actual cardiopulmonary resuscitation, as well as other life-sustaining treatments often faced by patients at the end of life. -
Treatment helps control involuntary outbursts?
Pseudobulbar affect (PBA) is a neurologic condition of involuntary, sudden, and frequent episodes of laughing or crying and is quite common in patients with underlying neurologic diseases or injuries, especially those with multiple sclerosis (MS) and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS). Now, a new investigational treatment might help stop these involuntary outbursts. -
Meditation helps anxiety, pain relief
Meditation has been used as a complementary treatment to reduce stress, manage anxiety, and lessen pain in patients with a wide range of illnesses, but a recent study provides scientific support for the use of meditation in pain control. -
Many elderly can't make decisions at death
More than one in four elderly Americans lacked the capacity to make their own medical care decisions at the end of life, according to a study of 3,746 people published April 1 in The New England Journal of Medicine. -
Cancer reports may paint overly optimistic view
Newspaper and magazine reports about cancer appear more likely to discuss aggressive treatment and survival than death, treatment failure or adverse events, and almost none mention end-of-life palliative or hospice care, according to a report in the Archives of Internal Medicine. -
Most cancer centers have palliative care programs
Palliative care services are available at most U.S. cancer centers, although the scope of services offered and the degree of integration between palliative care and oncology care varies widely among centers, according to a study in The Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA). -
Meditation techniques effective for pain relief
Meditation has analgesic benefits associated with creating a relaxed state of mind and enhancing the ability to moderate reactions to pain, according to new research published in The Journal of Pain, the peer review publication of the American Pain Society. -
New book provides tools to assist caregivers
It has become ever more apparent that health care is being provided by caregivers at home. But most laypersons find themselves inexperienced in caregiving. The good news is that support for this role is growing.