Palliative Care
DGHI affiliate Don Taylor, associate professor of public policy, was awarded a two-year $277,725 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation to study the relationship between use, cost and quality of community and hospital-based palliative care, and hospice care delivered in homes and inpatient facilities. Taylor and his research team will analyze the Palliative Care Database (PCD), which is based on a collaboration between Duke University and Four Seasons Hospice and Palliative Care, to describe the ways palliative care is provided, and describe its relationship with cost and quality. The study will help identify holes in the current reimbursement mechanisms for palliative care, particularly in Medicare. The project will also provide detailed information on the link between hospice use and quality, a necessary element to current discussions of reforming the Medicare hospice benefit.
Training for HIV Testing
Nathan Thielman, associate professor of medicine and global health, through DGHI’s Center for Health Policy has been awarded a one-year $17,500 grant from Emory University to provide health care provider training and technical assistance based on the 2006 HIV testing and counseling recommendations of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Health care providers and training plans in North Carolina will be identified and prioritized in collaboration with the North Carolina Division of Public Health, HIV/STD Prevention and Care Section and the Central Office.
