Palliative Care Coverage Across European National Health Systems: Proposal of a Synthetic Indicator

Overview

Journal Int J Environ Res Public Health

Publisher MDPI

Specialties Environmental Health
Public Health

Date 2021 Oct 23

PMID 34682495

Citations 6

Authors

Miguel Antonio Sanchez-Cardenas

Eduardo Garralda

Edgar Benitez

Natalia Arias-Casais

Danny van Steijn

Carlos Centeno

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

Background: The coverage of palliative care (PC) may be understood as a country's capacity to offer prevention and relief from serious health-related suffering in relation to an existing need. The aim of this study is to estimate European countries´ coverage capacities.

Method: Secondary analysis of three indicators, including the number of specialized services (SSPC), integration capacity scores (ICS) and the PC needs. By means of a K-medians clustering supervised algorithm, three coverage profiles were obtained: (1) Advanced: countries with high ICS and SSPC, and low PC needs; (2) Limited: countries with low ICS and SSPC, and low PC needs; and (3) Low: countries with low ICS and SSPC and high PC needs.

Results: On average, the ratio of specialized services per population was 0.79 per 100,000 inhabitants, the average ICS was 19.62 and the average number of deceased patients with SHS per 100,000 inhabitants was 5.69. Twenty countries (41%) reached an advanced coverage profile. Nine countries (18%) demonstrated a limited coverage profile; and 20 countries (41%) fell under a low-coverage capacity.

Conclusion: The level of palliative care coverage across Europe shows that 59% of European countries have either limited or very low availability of PC resources as regards their palliative care needs.

Citing Articles

From static snapshots to dynamic panoramas: the evolution and future vision of palliative care atlas in cross-national perspectives.

Tripodoro V, Pons J, Bastos F, Garralda E, Montero A, Bejar A Res Health Serv Reg. 2024; 3(1):5.

PMID: 39177852 PMC: 11281762. DOI: 10.1007/s43999-024-00043-z.

Palliative Care in the Ageing European Population: A Cross-Country Comparison.

Cerullo G, Figueiredo T, Coelho C, Campos C, Videira-Silva A, Carrilho J Int J Environ Res Public Health. 2024; 21(1).

PMID: 38276807 PMC: 10815293. DOI: 10.3390/ijerph21010113.

Palliative Care in Portugal-From Intention to Reality, What Is Yet to Be Accomplished.

Marques P, Rego F, Nunes R Nurs Rep. 2023; 13(4):1477-1485.

PMID: 37873831 PMC: 10594488. DOI: 10.3390/nursrep13040124.

Enhancing Global Development of Palliative Care: Insights from Country Experts on ATLANTES Observatory's Role.

Garralda E, Benitez E, Montero A, Sanchez-Cardenas M, Tripodoro V, Centeno C J Palliat Med. 2023; 26(12):1709-1714.

PMID: 37843901 PMC: 10714114. DOI: 10.1089/jpm.2023.0169.

Accessibility to specialist palliative care services in Germany: a geographical network analysis.

Gesell D, Hodiamont F, Bausewein C, Koller D BMC Health Serv Res. 2023; 23(1):786.

PMID: 37488579 PMC: 10364400. DOI: 10.1186/s12913-023-09751-7.

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