Hospice Coding and Data Conventions Contribute to Oversimplify the Presence of Dementia in Hospice

To document how dementia diagnoses appear in hospice claims, and how these different presentations reflect different hospice utilization. The reliance in the hospice literature on primary diagnosis, in addition to the focus on decedents, may underestimate the true presence of dementia in hospice, and little is known about the health care utilization of hospice patients with dementia as a secondary or not present diagnosis.