Designing an Office or Clinic Palliative Care Program
Patients who are neither hospitalized nor on hospice care need access to palliative care in a community clinic or office setting, such as a cancer center or dialysis unit. Such services may be delivered by physician groups or hospice- or home-health-based palliative care teams, or as extensions of an inpatient palliative care team and program.
Some office/clinic palliative care programs are embedded within another specialty clinic (for example, an oncology clinic), while others may share space within an existing clinic but operate independently; still others are geographically freestanding. Each model has operational and financial tradeoffs—learn more in the “Designing the Service” section of this toolkit.
What’s in the Toolkit
Needs Assessment
Engage stakeholders—patients and families, organizational leadership, referrers, and financial partners—to understand their priorities and guide program design.
The majority of people with serious illness are neither dying nor hospitalized. So, palliative care needs to be available in all settings outside hospitals—in medical offices and clinics, in post-acute and long-term care facilities, and in patient homes. This publication includes key data on the value of community palliative care, program profiles, and a case example to use with leadership.
Defining community-based palliative care: which patients need it, how it is delivered, and how it differs from inpatient palliative care.
Evaluating patient need, service requirements, care settings, and stakeholder priorities for the community-based palliative care program.
Step-by-step tool to evaluate patient need, stakeholder priorities, organizational readiness, and sites of care for a new or growing community-based palliative care service.
Comprehensive instructions and tools for conducting focus groups during a needs assessment. Published by Community Tool Box.
In this Virtual Office Hour, ask questions of expert faculty about launching a new community-based program, designing your service package and staffing, and navigating the challenges of a new program.
Program Design
Clinic-based palliative care services are delivered using a number of different models depending upon patient need, organizational priorities, and referrer relationships.
In this on-demand webinar, CAPC Consultant Connie Dahlin highlights three programs that have created community-based initiatives that promote access to quality, interprofessional palliative care in the community that is both replicable and sustainable.
The National Consensus Project (NCP) Clinical Practice Guidelines are the national standard for high quality palliative care. National Consensus Project for Quality Palliative Care, 2018.
Designing and implementing an office-based palliative care program, including clinical model and operational considerations.
Guidance on dosing interventions allocating visit frequency based on patient risk.
Steps to ensure high-quality, well-coordinated clinical care for the office-based interdisciplinary team.
Steps to ensure high-functioning administrative and operational practices for the office-based program.
Hire and onboard your staff, manage program operations, and ensure a healthy high-functioning team using this toolkit.
Key components of telehealth service delivery, especially in a home-based palliative care program.
Information about The Center for Connected Health Policy's new provider resource on Medicare and Medicaid reimbursement for telehealth and mHealth.
Sample service agreement and scope of practice for embedded palliative care services. Shared by the John D. Dingell VA Medical Center.
Business Planning for the Office/Clinic Program
Use these tools to design or update a sustainable business plan and budget for your clinic program.
Building a budget and a business plan for the community-based program. Includes business planning tools.
Tools for translating operational and service decisions into a realistic budget and business plan.
Billing for Palliative Care Services in the Clinic
Optimize your program’s billing practices to support financial viability.
Toolkit with billing and coding best practices for palliative care services delivered in the hospital or the community.
In this Virtual Office Hour, ask questions about billing for services provided in the home, office, or long-term care setting.
Measurement Tools for the Clinic Service
Collect data on outcomes that matter to your program’s financial and clinical stakeholders—including patients—and that facilitate continuous quality improvement. Use these tools to identify measures aligned with the concerns of your stakeholders, collect the data, and apply data analytics to demonstrate program value.
Use this toolkit to select program measures that demonstrate value to stakeholders and support quality care delivery. Overcome common measurement obstacles and synthesize program data.
Phone script and visit follow-up evaluation tool, including symptom assessment and patient satisfaction survey. Shared by the University of California San Francisco, 2013.
Satisfaction survey for bereaved families. Includes request for feedback on how to improve the service. Shared by Akron Children's Hospital, October 2008.
Sample executive summary of a year-end performance report, including service milestones and performance improvement indicators. Shared by OACIS Palliative Care, Lehigh Valley Health Network.
Assess satisfaction and generate feedback from referring providers. Shared by Froedtert Hospital.
Policies, Procedures, and Clinic Forms
Sample tools used by clinic-based palliative care teams to manage referrals, document patient visits, and maintain clinical quality.
Intake form for the new palliative care clinic patient. Shared by Massachusetts General Hospital, 2012.
Referral form for new palliative care patients see in clinic. Shared by Massachusetts General Hospital, 2012.
Check-out sheet including appointment status, next visit planning, testing requests, and recommended referrals. Shared by Massachusetts General Hospital, 2010.
Oncology clinic palliative care note template. Shared by UCSF Helen Diller Family Comprehensive Cancer Center, October 2008.
Template for standardized entry of H&P into the EHR, including all palliative care domains called for in the NCP Guidelines.
Template documentation for a patient call to the clinic. Shared by Massachusetts General Hospital, 2012.
Opioid pocket reference for providers including safe starting doses, equianalgesic chart, and standard dosing strengths.
Protocol for addressing requests for refills for non-controlled medications. Shared by the University of Alabama at Birmingham Supportive and Palliative Care Clinics.
Sample standard for bereavement services for the palliative care team. Shared by the University of Alabama at Birmingham Supportive and Palliative Care Clinics.
Sample Job Descriptions
Sample position descriptions for the clinic-based team.
Hire and onboard your staff, manage program operations, and ensure a healthy high-functioning team using this toolkit.
Faculty
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Diane E. Meier, MD, FACP, FAAHPM
Founder, Director Emerita and Strategic Medical Advisor, Center to Advance Palliative Care
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Constance Dahlin, MSN, ANP-BC, ACHPN, FPCN, FAAN
Consultant
Center to Advance Palliative Care -
Jeanne Sheils Twohig, MPA
Consultant
Center to Advance Palliative Care -
Brynn Bowman, MPA
Chief Executive Officer, Center to Advance Palliative Care
