End of Life Care

Introduction

Content last reviewed: 5 February 2015

• Over 499,000 people die each year in England of whom 68% were over 75 years (1).
• Death occurs in a wide variety of settings from hospitals, care homes and hospices to the home.  The PRISMA survey 2010 on the preferred place of death indicates that home and hospice are the most preferred place of death (63% and 29% respectively).
• The National End of Life Care Programme, launched in November 2004, aims to increase individuals’ choice over where they wish to live and die (2). Locally a strategy for End of Life Care 4 has been developed by a multiagency group with the main aim to allow patients to have ‘a good death’, for carers and families to feel comforted from their experiences and for people to die in their preferred place of death. Key workstreams of that strategy include:
  • 1. Care Homes ( Nurse Educators)
  • 2. Acute Care
  • 3. Social Care
  • 4. Primary Care
  • 5. Community Services (PEPS)
  • 6. Education
  • 7. Information and Audit
  • 8. Children and Young Adults

Last updated Friday, 22nd April 2016