Early palliative care intervention reduces hospitalizations and ensures optimization of patient comfort and trajectory of treatment (World Health Organization, 2020). However, patient safety and palliative care initiatives are not as integrated as they should be, considering many palliative care patients have a limited prognosis, have complex, multifaceted conditions, and are, therefore, more susceptible to detriment due to error. Furthermore, there is a lack of a clear distinction between end-of-life care, palliative care, and hospice care, which confounds the subsequent processes. Because these issues overlap significantly, interventions can be optimized for efficiency.

Our APSS outline actionable steps healthcare organizations should take to successfully implement and sustain behavior change for high reliability, shared understanding, thorough communication, and meaningful person-centered care across the organization.

Actionable steps include:

• Executive Summary Checklist
• Leadership checklist guide to determine whether current evidence-based guidelines are being followed in your organization
• Performance improvement plan to follow if improvements are necessary
• Clinical workflow for preoccupation with workflow for areas of improvement
• How to educate patients and family members about the significance of their role throughout the continuum
• Guidance on how to measure outcomes