The Location of Death and Dying Across Canada: A Study Illustrating the Socio-Political Context of Death and Dying

Donna M. Wilson, Ye Shen, Begoña Errasti-Ibarrondo and Stephen Birch
Additional contact information
Donna M. Wilson: Faculty of Nursing, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 1C9, Canada
Ye Shen: School of Public Health, University of Alberta, Edmonton, AB T6G 2R3, Canada
Begoña Errasti-Ibarrondo: Faculty of Nursing, University of Navarra, 31009 Pamplona, Spain
Stephen Birch: Centre for the Business and Economics of Health, University of Queensland, Brisbane QLD 4072, Australia

Societies, 2018, vol. 8, issue 4, 1-7

Abstract: Background: Concern has existed for many years about the extensive use of hospitals by dying persons. In recent years, however, a potential shift out of hospital has been noticed in a number of developed countries, including Canada. In Canada, where high hospital occupancy rates and corresponding long waits and waitlists for hospital care are major socio-political issues, it is important to know if this shift has continued or if hospitalized death and dying remains predominant across Canada. Methods: Recent individual-anonymous population-level inpatient Canadian hospital data were analyzed to answer two questions: (1) what proportion of deaths in provinces and territories across Canada are occurring in hospital now? and (2) who is dying in hospital now? Results: In 2014–2015, 43.9% of all deaths in Canada (excluding Quebec) occurred in hospital. However, considerable cross-Canada differences in end-of-life hospital utilization were found. Some cross-Canada differences in hospital decedents were also noted, although most were older, male, and they died during a relatively short hospital stay after being admitted from their homes and through the emergency department after arriving by ambulance. Conclusion: Over half of all deaths in Canada are occurring outside of hospital now. Cross-Canada hospital utilization and inpatient decedent differences highlight opportunities for enhanced end-of-life care service planning and policy advancements.

Keywords: hospital; death; aging; population data; hospital utilization; location of death; Canada (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: A13 A14 P P0 P1 P2 P3 P4 P5 Z1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2018
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/8/4/112/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/8/4/112/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jsoctx:v:8:y:2018:i:4:p:112-:d:181626

Access Statistics for this article

Societies is currently edited by Ms. Farrah Sun

More articles in Societies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().