Hospice and Palliative Care Handbook Quality, Compliance and Reimbursement

Hospice and Palliative Care Handbook, 2nd Edition includes everything hospice and palliative care professionals need to know to effectively provide and document quality care based on accepted professional standards. Presented in an easy-to-use handbook style, this is the only guide that offers clinicians complete coverage of all hospice-related conditions. Numerous hospice-related clinical problems are detailed, including standards and guidelines, services skills, outcomes and goals, and specific tips for reimbursement and quality. ICD-9 codes are presented for each condition.

This new edition has been updated with the latest information about hospice and palliative care and emphasizes trends such as bereavement services, the role of the volunteer, and pain. The major differences between hospice and home care documentation are distinguished.

• Provides standards reflecting the interventions, outcomes, and discharge plans appropriate for hospice patients with a variety of problems.
• Presents consistently formatted clinical care guidelines in an easy-to-access alphabetical order that offer specific direction for planning care.
• Offers practical tips for effective, complete documentation designed to meet the requirements of third-party payers such as Medicare.
• Incorporates services and outcomes of care for every member of the hospice team to facilitate interdisciplinary care, for example, the social worker, physical therapist, pharmacist, or dietician.
• Addresses patient and family educational needs and resources for care to promote self and family care.
• Includes psychosocial and spiritual considerations to provide a holistic approach to care.

• Integrates more information on pain including a pain care path, adjuvant analgesics, non-pharmacological interventions, and patient/family pain education information as minimizing pain is increasingly focused on in care.
• Increases information on bereavement services because hospice clinicians need this information as hospice care continues after the death of the patient.
• Includes additional information on the role of the volunteer because over half of all hospice employees work on a volunteer basis.
• Presents a section on caring for patients in inpatient areas such as ICUs.
• Address the major differences between hospice and home care documentation to ensure correct documentation in each setting.