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Context: Palliative care in oncology provides multiple benefits, however access to specialty palliative clinicians is limited in community cancer centers. Individual support services are more often available, but little is known on the utilization and impact of these services. Objectives: To describe the utilization of outpatient support services in the advanced cancer population and the association with ED and hospital use in a community setting. Methods: A retrospective chart review of 314 patients with advanced cancer of lung, gastrointestinal, genitourinary, and gynecologic origin was conducted. Data collected included demographics, descriptive data, type and number of support services (symptom management, nurse navigator, social worker, nutrition, financial counselor, chaplain, and oncology clinical counselor) within 90 days of diagnosis and descriptions of ED visits/hospitalizations within 12 months of diagnosis. Support services were available to patients by referral. Results: 29.6% of patients were deceased within 6 months and were considered to have severe disease. Patients with severe disease had a significantly greater mean number of support services than patients with non-severe disease (8.9 vs 6.0, p=0.001) and had a greater mean number of visits per year to the ED (6.4 vs 1.8, pConclusion: Our data demonstrated that advanced cancer patients with severe disease had increased healthcare utilization in all areas measured. Despite high utilization, outpatient support services used in a reactive manner were not effective in reducing ED or hospital visits.

Introduction: Studies have shown aggressive cancer care at the end of life is associated with decreased quality of life, decreased median survival, and increased cost of care. This study describes the patients most likely to receive systemic anticancer therapy at the end of life in a community cancer institute. Materials and Methods: We performed a retrospective cohort study of 201 patients who received systemic anticancer therapy in our institution and died between July 2016 and April 2017. Data collected included primary malignancy, hospice enrollment, healthcare utilization, Oncology Care Model (OCM) enrollment, and clinical assessments at last office visit prior to a treatment decision before death. We defined our outcome variable as the receipt of anticancer treatment in the last 14 days of a patient’s life. We evaluated 20 clinical exposure variables with respect to the outcome classes. Risk ratios along with their associated confidence intervals and P values were calculated. Significance was determined using the Benjamini-Hochberg procedure to account for multiple testing. Results: Of the 201 patients who died of cancer, 36 (17%) received anticancer therapy within the last 14 days of life. Several risk factors were significantly positively associated with receiving anticancer therapy at the end of life including hospitalization within 30 days of end of life, number of hospitalizations per patient (≥2), death in hospital, enrollment in OCM, and a diagnosis of hematologic malignancy. Conclusion: Our findings demonstrate those enrolled in the OCM and those with hematologic malignancies have a higher risk of receiving anticancer therapy in the last 14 days of life. These observations highlight the need for better identifying the needs of high-risk patients and providing good quality care throughout the disease trajectory to better align end-of-life care with patients’ wishes.