Health Affairs Blog-Fact or Fiction Advance Care Planning in Health Reform

by Chris Fleming

Patients with serious or advanced illnesses would be given more control over their care by language in health reform legislation passed by three House committees that would pay physicians, nurse practitioners, and other providers for counseling Medicare beneficiaries about advance planning for future care decisions.

That was the unanimous opinion expressed by three respected geriatricians at a August 20 conference intended to clarify several issues at the heart of the current health reform debate. The conference, Fact vs. Fiction: Key Issues in Health Reform, was sponsored by Health Affairs. The participants in the panel dealing with end of life issues were Christine Cassel, MD, President, American Board of Internal Medicine; Diane E. Meier, MD, Director, Center to Advance Palliative Care, Mount Sinai School of Medicine; and Jerald Winakur, MD, of the Center for Medical Humanities and Ethics at the University of Texas Health Science Center and author of “What Are We Going To Do With Dad?,” a Health Affairs 2005 Narrative Matters essay.

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