Palliative care consultation services in hospitals in the Netherlands: The design of the COMPASS study

Background: Patients with an advanced incurable disease are often hospitalised for some time during the last phase of life. Care in hospitals is generally focussed at curing disease and prolonging life and may therefore not in all cases adequately address the needs of such patients. We present the COMPASS study, a study on the effects and costs of consultation teams for palliative care in hospitals. This observational study aims to investigate the use, effects and costs of PCT consultation services for hospitalized patients with incurable cancer in the Netherlands. Methods/design: The study consists of 3 parts: 1. A questionnaire, interviews and a focus group discussion to investigate the characteristics of PCT consultation in 12 hospitals. PCTs will register their activities to calculate the costs of PCT consultation. 2. Cancer patients for whom the attending physician would not be surprised that they would die within 12 month will be included in a medical file search in three hospitals. Medical records will be investigated to compare care, treatment and hospital costs between patients with and patients without PCT consultation. 3. In the other nine hospitals, we will perform a longitudinal study, and compare quality of life between 100 patients for w