Day hospice care - a review of the literature

This paper traces the development and evaluation of day care hospice provision through analysis of the available literature. The CD-ROM was utilized to access and review the Medline, CINAHL and Healthstar databases. In addition, a hand search of Progress in Palliative Care was conducted. The literature describes the provision of a service within a day hospice, and access to day hospice services. issues regarding the provision of a day hospice as a mechanism to meet consumer needs are explored. The literature reveals little evaluation of evidence-based practice or of the cost-effectiveness of day hospice provision. There is a.dearth of research relating to day care, evaluation studies in particular. It is clearly important that future research compares outcomes with other models of service provision.