Development of the NHPCO research agenda.

In April 2003, a group of 35 leading researchers in hospice and palliative care participated in a research conclave to promote collaboration in our emerging field through a review of the current research priorities. The conclave was organized to pursue the following objectives: 1) to improve communication among existing centers of research excellence, 2) to explore opportunities for creating practice-based research networks, and 3)to identify critical areas of need for investigation. The conclave highlighted numerous areas of unexplored research and identified important issues in the field. Based on the input from participants in the conclave, and from other constituencies, NHPCO has developed are search agenda with the goal of framing important research objectives and questions that,if answered, would make an important contribution to our field. This report summarizes key issues identified by participants in the research conclave and presents the NHPCOresearch agenda, which is designed to further our goal of improving access to quality hospice and palliative care for patients who are at the end of life.