DCI Foundation Division

When dialysis patients approach the end of life, many face the difficult decision of choosing between stopping dialysis to receive hospice services or continuing dialysis treatments, as the current Medicare Hospice Benefit does not cover the cost of both hospice and dialysis. To eliminate this barrier to hospice services, DCI, the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC), and UPMC’s Family Hospice have partnered since 2018 to run the Concurrent Hospice-Dialysis Program in Western Pennsylvania, providing palliative dialysis treatments to patients in the program who elect to receive hospice services and dialysis treatments concurrently. The program aims to improve end-of-life care for people on dialysis by increasing access to hospice care and informing national policy toward developing a reimbursable hospice model that includes palliative dialysis.

In partnership with Adventist Health Tillamook, DCI is reopening the dialysis clinic in Tillamook, OR that was previously operated by another provider and was shut down earlier this year. The closure of the clinic resulted in a significant burden for the local patients who had received dialysis care at the facility, with most of them having to drive 60 miles to the next closest clinic. Though this clinic is projected to operate at a loss based on current reimbursement rates, the benefit to patients and the community is clear, so we are aiming to generate additional funding for this clinic through philanthropic donations to provide these services.