Center to Advance Palliative Care Announces New Leadership Centers

NEW YORK, (September 24, 2015)—The Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) announced today the creation of four new Palliative Care Leadership Centers™ (PCLC)—JourneyCare, North Shore LIJ Health System, Presbyterian Healthcare Services and the Rector and Visitors of the University of Virginia. The four new PCLCs will focus on palliative care in specific community settings, including the home, long term care and office settings. The initiative leads the national effort to address the growing demand from health care providers for assistance in providing palliative care in community settings. The goal is to more effectively manage the care of serious illness.

Palliative care is a new medical specialty focused on maximizing quality of life during serious illness through relief of the pain, symptoms and stress that patients commonly experience. Unlike hospice, it is delivered at the same time as all other appropriate treatments for the disease. Palliative care leads to better quality of care and lower total costs.  It is appropriate at any age and any stage of a serious illness.

Sponsored by the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC), the Palliative Care Leadership Centers™ (PCLC) provide customized, intensive operational training—and yearlong mentoring—for palliative care programs at every stage of development and growth. More than 1,100 hospital and hospice teams have trained with a PCLC since its inception in 2003.

“Palliative care has experienced rapid growth in hospitals over the last decade,” explained CAPC Director Diane E. Meier, MD. “With the expansion of the PCLC initiative into community settings, we are working towards the day when every person facing serious illness has access to quality palliative care where they are—whether at home, in a nursing home or in their doctor’s office.”

The new PCLCs join the seven current centers from diverse settings, including Akron Children’s Hospital, Fairview Health System, Mount Carmel Health System, Palliative Care Center of the Bluegrass, University of Alabama at Birmingham, University of California, San Francisco and VCU Massey Cancer Center.

The Palliative Care Leadership Centers initiative has two objectives: 1) Increase the number of quality palliative care programs across the United States in order to improve access for all people facing serious illness and 2) Foster sustainability and growth through leadership development, technical assistance and the use of standardized measures of program impact (e.g. quality of care, satisfaction, utilization and cost. It is a demonstrably effective method for the diffusion of palliative care innovation.

Visit capc.org for more information.