Palliative Care Designation for Cancer Patients
Identifying Attributes
Care Settings
Country
Publishing Organisation
Type of Quality Indicator
IOM Quality Dimension
Domain
Defining Attributes
Definition
Distribution of when the first palliative care code was applied for patients who died of cancer in an acute-care hospital. This indicator measures how early and often inpatients who died in an acute-care hospital with a cancer diagnosis were identified as "palliative care" patients. The designation of "palliative care" in an acute-care setting is based on the presence of the clinical code Z51.5 (Palliative Care) on a patient's abstract. The palliative care code should be applied to patient's abstracts whenever there is physician documentation of palliative care.
Numerator
Number of patients with no palliative care code, who had first palliative care code at final admission, or who had first palliative care code before final admission.
Denominator
Patients who died in an acute care hospital due to cancer
Exclusions
Patients aged <18, Unlinkable records
Use of Risk Adjustment
Risk Adjustments
None
Stratifications
Province and patient characteristics (age, sex, disease site)
Collection and Reporting Attributes
Type of Data Collection
Data Collection Methods
Data obtained from: Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI), Discharge Abstract Database; and Canadian Cancer Society, Cancer Statistics.
Frequency of Data Collection
Frequency of Data Collection in Days
Reporting Methods
Reporting Frequency
Reporting Frequency in Days
Indicator Has Recommended Targets
Source and Reference Attributes
Evidence Source
Canadian Partnership Against Cancer. Person-Centred Perspective Indicators in Canada: Palliative and End-of-Life Care Palliative, 2017. See: s22457.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/Palliative-and-end-of-life-care-reference-report-EN.pdf