Standards for providing quality palliative care for all Australians have been in place since 1994 with version 4 released in 2004. These standards were developed after extensive stakeholder consultation and seek to inform quality care for all Australians at the end of life. These standards apply to specialist palliative care services and primary care services. The National Standards Assessment Program (NSAP) has been developed to allow services to self assess themselves against these national standards. Many nurses will be aware of the standards, and those in specialist palliative care may have some involvement in working towards or completing an NSAP self-assessment. NSAP also provides mentor visits for those services who have undertaken the program and would like mentorship to support implementation of their quality action plan and to discuss their self assessment process.
Resources
Free Full Text Article
Dale J, Petrova M, Munday D, Koistinen-Harris J, Lall R, Thomas K. A national facilitation project to improve primary palliative care: impact of the Gold Standards Framework on process and self-ratings of quality. Qual Saf Health Care. 2009 Jun;18(3):174-80.
References
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Last updated 27 August 2010