Apoyo Con Carino: Patient Navigation for Palliative Care

Primary Outcome Measures:

• Improvement in Palliative Care Overall [ Time Frame: 3 months after enrollment ]
  Patient Navigator and Process Measure will capture the less tangible benefits of a patient navigator and help understand the effects of the many activities of the navigator beyond the scope of the prescribed intervention. The questions incorporate aspects of self-efficacy and patient activation (key concepts that patient navigators help improve).
  
  
• Evidence of Advance Care Planning [ Time Frame: 6 months after enrollment ]
  Chart review to determine if there is an advance directive in the medical record and classification of the type of advance directive (Medical Durable Power of Attorney (MDPOA), Advance Directive (AD), Living Will)
  
  
• Assesment of Pain Management [ Time Frame: 3 months after enrollment ]
  Pain management will be assessed through patient interviews utilizing the Brief Pain Inventory (BPI). The BPI Long Form (BPI-LF) is a 32-item self-report instrument that assesses the severity and impact of pain in patients with chronic diseases, e.g. cancer.
  
  
• Hospice Utilization [ Time Frame: 46 months after enrollment ]
  Length of stay in hospice program in days. Data will be collected through follow up phone calls, medical records review, and death records review to determine date of admission into hospice program and date of discharge (through death or dis-enrollment)
  
  

Secondary Outcome Measures:

• Aggressiveness of Care at the End of Life [ Time Frame: At month 46 ]
  For patients who have died within the follow up period this outcome assesses aggressiveness of care at the end of life using a composite measure comprised of the following: chemotherapy within 14 days of death no hospice hospice within 3 days of death
  
  
• Change in Quality of Life [ Time Frame: Baseline and 3 months after enrollment ]
  McGill Quality of Life questionnaire (MQOL) will be used at baseline and at 3 months after enrollment. The MQOL is specifically designed for a palliative care population, measuring whole-person concerns magnified by advanced life-limiting illness. It is short, reliable, repeatable, and can be used to determine changes in QOL of groups.
  
  

This project uses a patient navigator to deliver a culturally tailored intervention to improve palliative care for Latinos with advanced cancer in urban and rural communities. The proposed research aims to improve palliative care with the goal of preventing and relieving suffering for people facing serious, complex illness. Palliative care, according to the National Quality Forum and Centers for Medicare and Medicaid, provides patient and family-centered care offered in conjunction with curative and all other appropriate forms of medical treatment. It addresses physical, intellectual, emotional, social, spiritual needs, and facilitates patients' understanding of illness and choice. There is emerging evidence that palliative care may also improve survival for cancer patients. The proposed research also focuses on reducing health disparities. Studies have shown that Latinos are more likely to die in a hospital, less likely to use hospice services, and more likely to have unmanaged pain. This study will recruit 240 Latino patients with advanced cancer from an urban safety net hospital, a National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center, and several rural communities (including some of the poorest, most underserved counties in Colorado). Patients will be randomized to either a control or intervention group. The control group will receive written materials covering three important palliative care domains -advance care planning, pain management, and hospice care. The materials, in English and Spanish, are appropriate for patients with low health literacy. Patients in the intervention group will receive the same written materials but will also have a patient navigator who will make 5 home visits to review materials, help patients and families talk about goals/values, and complete an advance directive, all in a culturally and linguistically appropriate manner. The navigator may also help with: accessing community resources, participating in family meetings with health care providers, and offering support to patients and families. The investigators hypothesize that the intervention will increase advance care planning, improve pain management, increase hospice referrals, and patients will have improved palliative care overall at the end of life. The patient navigator model has demonstrated an ability to improve cancer screening, early diagnosis, treatment, and survivorship. Once the investigators demonstrate the efficacy of a patient navigator intervention to improve palliative care for advanced cancer patients, they can disseminate the training and intervention to all patient navigators working with Latino cancer patients.