Impacto econômico das unidades de cuidados paliativos hospitalares: revisão sistemática.

Abstract

Objective: To determine whether the practice of palliative care (PC) in specific units reduces hospital costs for terminally ill patients. Methods: A systematic literature review was carried out. Primary studies were searched in the LILACS, SCOPUS, SciELO, MEDLINE and Cochrane Library databases, published between January 2014 and January 2019, involving hospitalized adult terminally ill patients. Results: A total of 15 studies published in English and developed in nine countries were selected, all of them with high and medium-high income. Observational evidence was found related to the fact that patients in Palliative Care Units (PCU) had comparatively lower costs. Conclusion: Studies have compared cost minimization, but many did not report relevant economic analysis for PCU. The results of this review point to the need for research with economic analysis in health, in order to obtain broader subsidies of the interrelations between care and costs.