Palliative Pearls in Practice

Welcome to another new segment in Fast Facts – Palliative Pearls with Dr. Kelly Little

I am excited to share this new focus that aims to support us all providing care in our community to those with life limiting diagnoses.

We asked you, how you see palliative care. 82% are providing palliative care in their daily practice, many to their own patients in their longitudinal medical practices. In addition to office-based family medicine, many of you provide this care across a variety of settings to a variety of patients.

We asked you, if you aren’t providing palliative care, what barriers exist. Members almost universally spoke to a lack of time and support. Some noted inequitable remuneration.

You told us you have confidence and skills. Over 90% of you agreed that you felt comfortable initiating discussions about palliative care with patients and families.

You told us you felt supported when other services were involved with your patients including Home Health, Palliative Nursing, BC Cancer and the Palliative Support Line.

You told us it’s complex work. When your patient requires palliative care, it is time and resource intensive, requires a rapid or urgent response and is complex to navigate the healthcare system efficiently.

The Vision

As this Palliative Pearls feature in Fast Facts progresses, we envision grassroots work that focuses on:

• Knowledge translation and communication
  • Clinical tools, community resources or even our own member work in the coming months
  • Online hub to collate and simplify resources and streamline care pathways
• Engaging with partners – it cannot be done alone already begun to collaborate with health authorities
• Building a Community of Practice – tell us what you need to do this work