The few existing palliative-care units have only recently accepted people with AIDS, mainly because of a lack of information on the extent of the physical and psychological pain connected with the disease. In both Montr al and Paris, mobile teams are being created to offset the disadvantages of fixed units. The cost of palliative care was discussed in the thesis insofar as this kind of service forces hospitals to maintain very high numbers of medical staff. Only with great difficulty would this appear to meet the profitability criteria developed by most institutions in managing their operations. AIDS treatment has not escaped this.
Hospices are also part of the out-patienting of affected people.
However, in France this distribution model is in an experimental stage only. Gardanne, near Marseilles, is the pilot city, whereas Montr al already has about ten hospices. Nevertheless, approaches diverge mainly with respect to the development of beneficiary profiles. Some hospices, as in the French model, have targeted beneficiaries who are experiencing a radical loss of autonomy. Consequently, the average stay in a hospice is approximately three months, and 70 percent of residents die in the establishment without returning to hospital.