NW London community-based specialist palliative care for adults: next steps - 5 September 2023

We would like to say thank you to everyone who attended the event.  Their thoughts and feedback will be used as evidence as we move forward to develop the future model of care.

View the recording of the meeting

View the presentation

Key highlights

  • Attendees questioned how the model of care will address equality issues such as poverty, gender and sexuality. They emphasised the need to consider people living without family in NW London, particularly the growing number of elderly people living in poverty and questioned whether they were considered as a group when developing the model of care.
  • An attendee raised the need to consider atheists and pagans when considering people of faith communities.
  • Concerns were raised over whether the model of care has considered location (where people live and the communities that are important to them), so that the model fits the needs of the location, not vice-versa.
  • Concerns were raised over providing care in the home, including: the cost of home care vs. in-patient care; the source of funding; the staff required to support home care; whether there are implications for council and adult social care staff; whether it is more expensive for someone to die at home than in hospital; and whether councils would have a role in funding the MOC? 
  • The importance of advanced care planning and promoting this more widely was emphasised and one attendee questioned whether voluntary euthanasia should be included as a pathway to avoid a painful end of life.
  • The need to help people identify where they will get services from was emphasised as was the need to help people understand the difference between 999 and 111 services.
  • The importance of staff demonstrating care, compassion, dignity and respect for patients was highlighted and a question raised over why this is not mentioned in the model of care.
  • Concerns were raised over clarity on who will manage the overall service and take responsibility for patient issues and how palliative care services will be managed in relation to the other services.
  • Attendees requested more detail on how the enhanced care beds will be used and who will manage them.

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