Why is end-of-life spending so high?

The answer is because using more intensive services does reduce mortality. This is the finding of a recent JAMA paper. After controlling for patient case mix, the authors examine variation in hospital spending in the last year of a patient’s life. The authors note that “Higher-spending hospitals differed in many ways, such as greater use…

The Value of End-of-Life Medical Care

Some estimates claim that one-quarter of life-time spending on medical care occurs in the last year of an individual’s life.  Conventional wisdom says this is inefficient, but a paper by Philipson, Becker, Goldman and Murphy (2010) disagrees.  Individuals at the end of their life place very high value on terminal medical care for the following…