The medical director of a hospice reviews the state of hospice care in the United States. Rhymes outlines the history and philosophy of the modern hospice movement and summarizes the findings of recent studies comparing the efficacy and costs of hospice care with those of conventional care of the dying. She identifies and discusses barriers to hospice care, which currently is available only to a small proportion of terminally ill patients in the United States. Rhymes concludes with suggestions of changes that could renew and expand the role of hospices and lead to more humane care for the dying. (KIE abstract)
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J. Rhymes (1990) studied this question.