Support for receiving high quality care.
Supporting your choices
As Australia’s population ages and the number of people using aged care services increases, the demand for palliative care in aged care is also increasing.
It is important that older people are supported to receive high quality palliative care in the setting of their choice, whether that be in their own home, in a residential aged care facility, in an acute care hospital or in a dedicated hospice service.
Ensuring the availability of high quality palliative care in aged care facilities and people’s own homes will enable more older Australians to have a good death, receive better support for their families and carers during the dying and bereavement process, and facilitate improved allocation of scarce health resources.
Recommended Links, Trainings & Resources:
Palli8 – Palliative care is core business for aged care
Palliative Care Australia (PCA), together with the sector more broadly, has advocated strongly for many years that palliative care must be considered core business in aged care. As Australia’s population ages and the number of people using aged care services increases, the demand for palliative care in aged care is also increasing.
PCA has released a report, Palliative care is core business for aged care, summarising the Commission’s recommendations against PCA’s original Palli-8 eight-point plan for palliative care in aged care published in September 2020. This report highlights the alignment between the Commission’s recommendations and PCA’s recommendations as expressed in Palli-8, PCA’s eight-point plan for palliative care in aged care.
Overview to Aged Care
Since the Royal Commission into Aged Care handed down its final recommendations in February 2021, the pace of change has continued to accelerate in response to the challenges and needs of the industry. As we are all aware these challenges were stretched tremendously during the COVID-19 pandemic particularly in Victoria, but also other areas.
Jenny Cotterell, from Palliative Care Victoria, has written the following articles:
- An overview of the aged care reforms, particularly in regard to palliative and end of life care.
- A brief summary of the Star Rating System introduced in December 2022 in response to Recommendation 24 of the Royal Commission in Aged Care Quality.
- Summary of findings from the resident experience surveys 2017 – 2019