Wild Card - Hospital Type May Play Role in Decision on Feeding Tubes

I've always heard you get wiser as you get older. Unfortunately, we are also more susceptible to age related diseases that affect our cognitive ability such as dementia. According to WebMD, dementia is "a loss of mental skills that affects your daily life." This disease progressively worsens over time and each individual's case is unique. Dementia is one of the world's fastest growing disease, here's a staggering statistic: "Worldwide, there are now an estimated 24 million people living with some form of dementia. Without a major medical breakthrough in the fight against dementia, this number could jump to as many as 84 million who have age-related memory loss by the year 2040" (disabled-world.com).

With so many people affected by dementia, I was bothered when I came across an article in the New York Times about Aging: Hospital Type May Play Role in Decision on Feeding Tubes. It talked about how a majority of hospital patients with advanced dementia are usually given feeding tubes. Although the use of feeding tubes does not increase their chances of living longer. A new study indicates the practice of feeding tubes is more prevalent at certain hospitals.

The study was in last month's issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association and it utilized data from over a quarter of a million admissions of nursing home residents to thousands of hospitals in 2000 to 2007. "Large hospitals and for-profit hospitals were more likely than others to insert the tubes, as were hospitals deemed aggressive about providing end-of-life care" (nytimes.com).

It was interesting to know that these findings suggested that decisions related to the care of dementia patients are likely to be based on hospital practices than the patient's or their families' wishes. With the increasing amount of people affected by dementia it certainly is troubling thinking about how one's wishes are not being respected in their health care. All hospitals should practice humane services. Another improvement that could be made is how the patient's family is informed on deciding for their loved ones. Actions taken should ultimately be based on the patient's previous wishes.


Resources:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/16/health/16aging.html
http://www.disabled-world.com/health/aging/dementia/statistics.php
http://www.webmd.com/alzheimers/tc/dementia-topic-overview