Home Health & Hospice Week

Hospices in New York may soon see if more education will lead to better utilization of the hospice benefit. The New York Palliative Care Information Act, a law that takes effect Feb. 9, mandates that a "patient's attending health care practitioner shall offer to provide the patient with information and counseling regarding palliative care and end-of-life options appropriate to the patient" either verbally or in writing.

But not every physician must have the discussion, the law states. A practitioner who feels undereducated about or uncomfortable with discussing hospice or other palliative options can either arrange for another provider to have the talk or can transfer the patient to a provider who's better able to guide the patient, the Associated Press reports.

Also, patients who aren't interested in having an end-of-life discussion can opt out of it, the regulation stipulates.

Advocates for the regulation insist it will help patients with advanced medical illness to make more informed decisions and have a choice in the quality of their lives. Through the rule, providers and patients will discuss "how that patient wants to die [and] how that patient wants to live before they die," physician Lauren Shaiova, chief of Metropolitan Hospital Center's Department of Pain Medicine and Palliative Care in New York City, told the AP.

Despite the high emotions surrounding "death panels" and other euphemisms about end-oflife discussions, you can expect other states to follow in New York's footsteps, experts predict.