CAPC scorecard places Connecticut among top states; council eyes Medicaid payment, pediatric supports

Stacy Sinclair of the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) told the Connecticut Palliative Care Advisory Council in a virtual meeting that CAPC’s new Serious Illness Scorecard rates Connecticut 7.5 out of 10 — a score CAPC converts to 3.75 stars and then rounded up — placing the state among the top eight nationally for capacity to deliver or advance palliative care. "Connecticut got a 4 and I won't bury the lead," Sinclair said during her presentation, later adding, "your final score was 7 and a half out of 10."

The scorecard measures states across 10 indicators in five domains, including specialty palliative care availability, certified specialists per population, payment and insurance coverage, structured champions and advocacy, and education and community supports. Sinclair told the council CAPC preserved the prior metric on the proportion of hospitals with 50 or more beds that report a palliative care program, and added measures such as the number of certified hospice and palliative care professionals per 100,000 people, the presence of state legislation or regulation to expand specialty palliative care payment, whether the state's largest commercial insurer shows a unique…