Tools to help seriously ill patients near death make decisions about their care aren't commonly used in routine practice

(The Dartmouth Institute for Health Policy & Clinical Practice) Many seriously ill people in the United States -- and around the world -- are not dying as they would like. Yet, a new study led by Dartmouth Institute Ph.D. student Catherine Saunders found that although there are dozens of tools available to help people make difficult decisions near the end of their lives, they are of varying quality and very few are actually available for patients and families to use in hospitals.

from EurekAlert! - Social and Behavioral Science https://ift.tt/2E31rYm