Facts & Figures

How We Die

· Nearly half of all Americans die in a hospital. Source: Centers for Disease Control (2005) [PDF]

· Nearly 70 percent of Americans die in a hospital, nursing home or long-term-care facility. Source Centers for Disease Control (2005) [PDF]

· 7 out of 10 Americans say they would prefer to die at home. Source: Time/CNN Poll (2000)

· Only 25 percent of Americans actually die at home. Source: Centers for Disease Control (2005) [PDF]

· More than 80 percent of patients with chronic diseases say they want to avoid hospitalization and intensive care when they are dying. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· Hospitalizations during the last six months of life are rising: from 1,302 hospital admissions per 1,000 Medicare recipients in 1996 to 1,442 in 2005. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· ICU stays of longer than a week have been increasing. In 1996, 10 percent of Medicare recipients spent at least a week in an ICU during the last six months of their lives; by 2005, the number was 14.4 percent. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· The 10 leading causes of death in America are (in order): heart disease, cancer, stroke, chronic lower respiratory disease, accidents, Alzheimer's, diabetes, influenza and pneumonia, kidney disease and sepsis (infection). Source: Centers for Disease Control (2007)

· 7 out of 10 Americans die from chronic disease. More than 90 million Americans live with at least one chronic disease. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· Almost a third of Americans see 10 or more physicians in the last six months of their life. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· Only 20 to 30 percent of Americans report having an advance directive such as a living will. Source: Associated Press, 2010

· Even when patients have an advance directive, physicians are often unaware of their patients' preferences. One large-scale study found that only 25 percent of physicians knew that their patients had advance directives on file. Source: Critical Care Journal (2007)

Cost of Care at the End of Life

· Patients with chronic illness in their last two years of life account for about 32 percent of total Medicare spending. Source: Dartmouth Atlas of Health Care (2005)

· Medicare pays for one-third of the cost of treating cancer in the final year, and 78 percent of that spending occurs in the last month. Source: HemOnc Today (2008)

· One large-scale study of cancer patients found that costs were about a third less for patients who had end-of-life discussions than for those who didn't. Source: Archives of Internal Medicine (2009)

Bone Marrow Transplants

· The first successful human bone marrow transplant occurred in 1968. Source: eMedicine

· Bone marrow contains the most abundant supply of stem cells for transplants. However, transplants can also be done using stem cells collected from the bloodstream or from an umbilical cord. Source: National Cancer Institute

· Patients can provide their own bone marrow or stem cells for the transplant. They can also receive bone marrow or stem cells from a relative or an unrelated donor. Source: National Cancer Institute

· More than 100 dieases can potentially be treated with blood stem cell transplants. The most common diseases treated with transplants are blood cancers, such as multiple myeloma, leukemia, lymphoma and Hodgkin's disease. Transplants can also be used to treat certain autoimmune diseases and solid tumors. Source: Blood & Marrow Transplant Information Network

· Over the past 20 years, the number of transplants for severe aplastic anemia from unrelated donors has increased more than 20-fold. Source: American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation

· Transplant treatments have helped to increase the survival rate for many diseases, in some cases dramatically. The two-year survival rate for severe aplastic anemia has nearly doubled in just 10 years. Source: American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation

· Transplant centers generally place limits on the age of patients to whom they will give transplants. However, the number of patients over the age of 55 receiving transplants has increased substantially in the past 10 years. In 2000, just 8 percent of the initial transplants facilitated by the National Marrow Donor Program were for patients 55 and older. By 2005, 21 percent of transplant recipients were 55 and older. Source: American Society for Blood and Marrow Transplantation

· African Americans have a smaller chance of finding a donor match than whites. The likelihood of finding at least one potential match for African Americans is 60 percent, compared with 88 percent for whites. Only about 7 percent of those registered with the National Marrow Donors Program are African American; 74 percent are white. Source: USA Today (2010)

· Bone marrow transplants cost $1.3 billion in 2007. Between 2004 and 2007, the procedure had one of the largest increases in hospital costs -- 84.9 percent -- of any medical procedure. Source: Healthcare Costs and Utilization Project (2009) [PDF]

Intensive Care

· Eight percent of all licensed hospital beds in the United States are in ICUs. Source: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

· More than 4 million patients are admitted to ICUs each year in the United States. Source: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

· Mortality rates in patients admitted to the ICU average 10 to 20 percent in most hospitals. Source: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

· Patients in ICUs occupy between 5 and 10 percent of inpatient beds in hospitals, but account for 20 to 35 percent of total hospital costs. Source: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

· Respiratory failure is the most common cause of ICU admission. Source: Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations

· After a year on a mechanical ventilator, the mortality rate for patients in long-term acute care hospitals ranges from 48 to 69.1 percent. Source: Journal of the American Medical Association (2010) [Subscription required]