Telehealth-enabled Integrated Palliative Care for People With Dementia

One in 3 deaths for those over the age of 65 are caused by Alzheimer's or related dementia. Lack of goals-of-care conversations with these patients drives up end-of-life healthcare costs due to excessive use of medical procedures and places unnecessary decision-making burden on caregivers. Such realities exhibit how existing models of specialty palliative care are suffering too great of a workforce shortage to adequately meet the needs of increasing numbers of PwD and are also inaccessible to underrepresented minorities (URMs) due to cost. Implementing a TIPC model could improve these outcomes through intersectional engagement of relevant health entities to carve more concrete care goals and drive down overall care cost.

This trial will enroll 50 patients and caregivers (when appropriate). Half of the patient participants will be given the TIPC intervention and all participants will be assessed over 12 months to assess changes in patient-important outcomes. For both groups, the researchers will evaluate goal attainment, quality of life, decision making, caregiver support/burden, and clinician/payor satisfaction. Assessments will be ongoing throughout the year (baseline, 3, 6, 9, and 12 months) to fully illustrate what kind of sustained impact or change in trajectory this brief intervention may have, and if other gaps are later identified.

Patient participants will be recruited from Jefferson EMR reports, physician referrals, and other forms of outreach. Patient participants will be randomly assigned to study groups (25 intervention, 25 control). If a patient is randomized to the intervention group, researchers will ask if they have a caregiver so that they may be enrolled in the study as well. Intervention subjects will partake in two telehealth visits as a part of the TIPC model. The first telehealth visit will focus on ACP and identifying patient-important outcomes via a web-based tool for discussion with a palliative care (PC) specialist. The second telehealth visit will involve patient communication of their patient important outcomes (PIOs) to a primary care provider (PCP) and the translation of those PIOs into care plans for ongoing management. Control subjects will be followed as they continue with their usual standard of care. They will also complete all measures at pre-specified time points and researchers will assess for changes in GAS, provider burden and decision making as well as hospitalizations, hospice, palliative care plans.

All patient/caregiver dyads assigned to the intervention group will be interviewed remotely after the intervention via survey to assess their goal attainment, satisfaction with care and connectivity to community resources.

Evaluation of patient outcomes of the TIPC model will be ongoing and through an assets/strengths-based framework. At baseline, 3, 6, 9, and 12 months, patient quality of life, decision-making, and caregiver support/burden will be measured through a series of follow-up assessments.