The Washington Home Center for Palliative Care Studies
The Washington Home Center for Palliative Care Studies is a scholarly team that conducts research and supports quality improvement efforts designed to make the end of life comfortable and meaningful. In particular, the Center works to help the public learn how to manage end of life issues, and to help health care providers learn how to improve their practices. The Center, which has been at work since 1995, joined RAND in 2000.
The Center's MediCaring project, www.medicaring.org, structures an effort to implement and evaluate comprehensive and coordinated care across providers for a cohort of those who are "sick enough to die," especially those with advanced heart and lung disease, as well as to examine caregiver issues.
Quality improvement efforts in end-of-life care are remarkably effective. The Center has worked with nearly one hundred health care organizations, helping them implement effective quality improvement projects in care for serious chronic illness toward the end of life. By participating in successful national and regional Quality Improvement Collaboratives throughout the years, clinical teams have dramatically improved quality of care for the populations they serve and have addressed issues ranging from alleviating pain to assuring advance care planning.
Recent Publications
End-of-Life Care: An Agenda for Policy Improvement — 2005
Shugarman LR, Lorenz K, Lynn J.
Clinical Geriatric Medicine , Vol. 21, No. 1, Feb 2005, pp. 255-272
Sick to Death and Not Going to Take It Anymore: Reforming Health Care for the Last Years of Life — 2004
Joanne Lynn
University of California Press, 2004
End-of-Life Care and Outcomes: Summary — 2004
Lorenz K, Lynn J, Morton SC, Dy S, Mularski R, Shugarman L, Sun V, Wilkinson AM, Maglione M, Shekelle PG
Read the Full Document at ahrq.gov
Management of Implantable Cardioverter Defibrillators in End-of-Life Care — 2004
Goldstein NE, Lampert R, Bradley E, Lynn J, Krumholz HM
Annals of Internal Medicine, Vol. 141, No. 11, Dec 7 2004, pp. 835-838, W-155
Medicare Program Costs Associated with Hospice Use — 2004
Campbell DE, Lynn J, Louis TA, Shugarman LR
Annals of Internal Medicine, Vol. 140, No. 4, Feb 17 2004, pp. 269-277
Read the Full Document at annals.org 
News Release
Living Well at the End of Life: Adapting Health Care to Serious Chronic Illness in Old Age — 2003
Joanne Lynn, David M. Adamson
Improving Care for the End of Life: A Sourcebook for Clinicians and Managers — 2000
Joanne Lynn, M.D. Janice Lynch Schuster, and Andrea Kabcenell, R.N.
Aims to help provider organizations improve care.
Handbook for Mortals: Guidance For People Facing Serious Illness — 1999
Joanne Lynn, M.D. and Joan Harrold, M.D.
Offers common sense advice about issues ranging from pain management to navigating the care system. Helps patients and families take charge of the end of life.
Contact Information
For further information, contact:
The Washington Home Center for Palliative Care Studies
4200 Wisconsin Avenue, N.W.
4th Floor
Washington, DC 20016
202-895-2625
202-966-5410/fax
info@medicaring.org
Center Director:
Joanne Lynn, MD, MA, MS
Center Staff:
Anne Wilkinson, PhD
Sarah Myers, MPH
Maureen Lilly
Lisa Spear
Ekta Chaudhry
Roshon Gibson
Lin Noyes, PhD
Hsien Seow
Sharon Love
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