School of Medicine and Health Sciences Poster Presentations
Improving Advance Care Planning in Primary Care
Poster Number
294
Document Type
Poster
Publication Date
3-2016
Abstract
End of life care has become an increasingly important aspect of health care in the past decade. Primary care physicians play an important role in advanced care planning (ACP) and thus end-of-life care by starting advanced care discussions with patients early on in their patient-physician relationship.
The objective of our quality improvement project is to improve the rate of ACP discussions in the primary care setting as well as the documentation of these discussions. More specifically, our aim is to increase the documentation of advance directive discussions in routine physicals performed by internal medicine resident physicians for patients age 50 and older by 20% in each PDSA cycle. Interventions (of which PDSA cycles will be built around) to increase discussions and documentation include 1) adding questions regarding advance care directives to the intake history and physical form 2) providing clear, concise information regarding ACP as a reference for patients and physicians (to be discussed during the same-day history and physical or during a subsequent visit dedicated to discussing advance care planning), 3) informing attending physicians of the above changes, and 4) providing more training regarding ACP discussions in a didactic setting via a Geriatric/Palliative Care physician.
Data collection is ongoing. Data from prior PDSA cycles indicated that interventions should target teaching residents practical skills and methods to have end of life discussions with their patients and in familiarizing residents with resources and reading materials that can be shared with their patients.
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Open Access
1
Improving Advance Care Planning in Primary Care
End of life care has become an increasingly important aspect of health care in the past decade. Primary care physicians play an important role in advanced care planning (ACP) and thus end-of-life care by starting advanced care discussions with patients early on in their patient-physician relationship.
The objective of our quality improvement project is to improve the rate of ACP discussions in the primary care setting as well as the documentation of these discussions. More specifically, our aim is to increase the documentation of advance directive discussions in routine physicals performed by internal medicine resident physicians for patients age 50 and older by 20% in each PDSA cycle. Interventions (of which PDSA cycles will be built around) to increase discussions and documentation include 1) adding questions regarding advance care directives to the intake history and physical form 2) providing clear, concise information regarding ACP as a reference for patients and physicians (to be discussed during the same-day history and physical or during a subsequent visit dedicated to discussing advance care planning), 3) informing attending physicians of the above changes, and 4) providing more training regarding ACP discussions in a didactic setting via a Geriatric/Palliative Care physician.
Data collection is ongoing. Data from prior PDSA cycles indicated that interventions should target teaching residents practical skills and methods to have end of life discussions with their patients and in familiarizing residents with resources and reading materials that can be shared with their patients.
Comments
Presented at: GW Research Days 2016