==== Front
Innov Aging
Innov Aging
innovateage
Innovation in Aging
2399-5300 Oxford University Press US 

10.1093/geroni/igaa057.2709
igaa057.2709
Abstracts
Session 7030 (Symposium)
AcademicSubjects/SOC02600
VA’s Life-Sustaining Treatment Decisions Initiative: First 20 Months of National Implementation
Ersek Mary 1 Scott Winifred 2 Carpenter Joan 3 Kononowech Jennifer 4 Phibbs Ciarian 5 Cohen Jennifer 6 Foglia Mary Beth 7 Levy Cari 8 1 
Department of Veterans Affairs, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States
2 
VA Palo Alto Healthcare System, Palo Alto, California, United States
3 
Department of Veterans Affairs, Berlin, Maryland, United States
4 
VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System, Ann Arbor, Michigan, United States
5 
VA Palo Alto Healthcare System, Menlo Park, California, United States
6 
VA Puget Sound Health Care System, Seattle, Washington, United States
7 
VA - National Center for Ethics in Health Care, Seattle, Washington, United States
8 
VA Eastern Colorado Health Care System, Aurora, Colorado, United States
2020 
16 12 2020 
16 12 2020 
4 Suppl 1 Program Abstracts from The GSA 2020 Annual Scientific Meeting “Turning 75: Why Age Matters”752 752
© The Author(s) 2020. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of The Gerontological Society of America.2020This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.Abstract
This retrospective observational study describes the first 20 months of implementing the Life-Sustaining Treatment Decisions Initiative. We examined patient and facility characteristics associated with life sustaining treatment (LST) orders template completion, including the association between template completion and the Care Assessment Need (CAN) score, which quantifies Veterans’ risk of hospitalization and mortality. As of February 29, 2020, over 274,200 Veterans received at least one goal of care conversation and LST preferences documented on a template. Eighty-two percent of deceased Veterans with the highest risk of hospitalization or mortality had an LST note and order documented prior to their death. Factors that predicted a greater likelihood of LST template completion included higher CAN score, older age, nursing home stay, and being white non-Hispanic. Findings suggest that clinicians are engaging older, sicker veterans in goals of care conversations. Research is needed to understand potential disparities in LST template completion.