Subscribe Blog Contact
The views and opinions expressed in our blog series are those of the authors and are not necessarily supported by CareSearch, Flinders University and/or the Australian Government Department of Health.
Let’s be frank, end-of-life care can be tricky. Yes, dying is normal, but it hasn’t been a major focus in the acute hospital systems. Health care professionals working in acute hospitals can find themselves challenged by patients with end-of-life care needs. Doctors, nurses and allied health professionals can be in a situation where they do not know how to best respond to a patient with end-of-life needs. Appropriate end-of-life interventions can be missed. With 52% of Australians dying in acute hospitals, end-of-life care is essential knowledge for all health care professionals.
I had the pleasure of coordinating the May edition of the CareSearch Allied Health Hub (AHH) newsletter in which we chose to highlight Motor Neurone Disease (MND) for three reasons: 1. Allied health practitioners play a very important role in a multidisciplinary approach which improves quality of life, for both patient and family. 2. Palliative Care week and MND week both occur in May and it was an opportune time to highlight MND. 3. MND is entering the sphere of practice for more allied health practitioners and it has been brought to the public’s attention recently with fundraisers like “Freeze MND”.