Service providers of Tasmania’s palliative care program hospice@HOME, met today to discuss the future of the program and urge the federal government to continue funding for a further two years in order to produce valuable data for the whole of Australia.
Both current patients and loved ones of past patients are also attending the meeting to share their stories and give the community an insight into the benefits of the program.
hospice@HOME has enabled people to fulfil their wish of dying with dignity at home while also giving Tasmanians better access to palliative care using a multi-disciplinary approach to in home end of life services, provided by The District Nurses.
Over 50 people are expected to attend the workshop, with the majority being hospice@HOME service providers from around Tasmania, as well as state and federal decision makers.
However, hospice care is not only a matter of personal preference, it delivers services in the community which have additional benefits of relieving pressure on hospital and emergency services while being more cost-effective to deliver.
After implementation in June 2013, the program has already shown to significantly decrease bed occupancy with in the public hospital system. While it costs $1,600 a night to care for a person in hospital, hospice@HOME delivers the care at home (preventing hospital or residential admission) for as little as $55 a day.
Without ongoing funding, in June 2016 hospice@HOME will be forced to cease providing services to new referrals, and it is expected the program will all together cease by March 2017.
If funding is secured until 2019, it will enable hospice@HOME to collect and provide valuable data to both the State and Federal Government to create a strong policy framework for palliative care both locally and nationally.
The District Nurses’ engage over 50 Tasmanian service providers to deliver wrap-around packages of care to their clients at home, within their community. Loss of funding would have a significant impact on the ability for these providers to deliver end of life care to the states highly dispersed rural and remote population.
hospice@HOME was funded by the Federal Government in June 2013 through the ‘Better Access to Palliative Care’ package to provide support for palliative care for all Tasmanians if they wish to die at home.
Georgi Wicks, Font PR
