Correspondence between patients' preferences and surrogates' understandings for dying and death

We examined the agreement between hospice patients' perferences for desired experiences during the last week of life and their surrogates' understandings of those preferences (n = 92 pairs). Analyses included percent agreement, intraclass correlation coefficients, and Bland-Altman plots. Demographic characteristics and communication measures associated with better agreement were identified using t-tests and analysis of variance. The median number of items on which patients and family members agreed was 14 of 30 (interquartile range, IQR 10, 16). Preferences with good agreement included both observable and nonobservable experiences. Patients who reported having had conversations about treatment preferences and who reported that their surrogates knew their preferences reported higher agreement. Surrogates display a better understanding of what is important to patients at the end of life if they had discussions about patients preferences. These discussions may enable surrogates and clinicians to more accurately follow patient preferences.