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Blacks More Likely to Leave Hospice for Life-extending Treatment Than Whites
February 04, 2008 at 2:57 PM
General Health News
End-of-Life Care
Blacks enrolled in a hospice program are more likely than whites to leave hospice to pursue life-extending treatment, according to a study published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, Reuters Health reports.
For the study, Kimberly Johnson of Duke University and colleagues looked at files of 166,197 black and white patients who received care from VITAS, a chain of hospice facilities. The study found that 2.8% of all patients left hospice to pursue life-prolonging treatment. According to the study, blacks were 70% more likely than whites to leave hospice care to seek treatment unavailable in a hospice. The study found that 4.5% of blacks left hospice to seek life-prolonging treatment, compared with 2.5% of whites.
Previous research has indicated that blacks are much less likely than whites to enter a hospice and more likely to request life-sustaining treatment at the end of life. According to the study authors, "These beliefs and values that emphasize longevity and deny death" clash with the hospice philosophy. A lack of understanding hospice services, which emphasize care rather than cure, might be more common among black patients, the study authors said.
They added that "models of health care that couple curative and (supportive) therapies may be more attractive to African-American patients and more effective at maximizing continuity throughout life-limiting illness".
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