ABSTRACT
Elderly cancer patients often require a range of health care services for the management and treatment of their disease. Malignancy in the older person is often accompanied by a number of other chronic conditions and comorbidities that may cause cognitive impairment, frailty, and diminished capacity for independent function. Ideally, health care services for older adults would provide a coordinated continuum of care ranging from acute care to supportive or long-term-care services. Although the elderly cancer patient would greatly benefit from such an approach with a multidisciplinary care team for disease treatment and management, too often the reality consists of a health care delivery and financing system that is fragmented and confusing. The system often discourages coordination of services and offers little incentive to integrate acute, subacute, and long-term care services (1).
