The Australian Government Department of Health, Disability and Ageing has extended funding for the Greater Choice for At Home Palliative Care until October 2025.
The Greater Choice for At Home Palliative Care measure aims to improve access to safe, quality palliative care at home. Enabling more people to receive the right care, in the right place at the right time.
At the heart of this program being implemented by WA Primary Health Alliance are two main goals:
- To promote choice about what matters most to people who are approaching the end of their lives by improving awareness of advance care planning and palliative care.
- To develop a model of care which acknowledges the work of GPs in the care of people at the end of their life. We will support GPs to identify potential unmet palliative needs of people with complex chronic illness early and provide a planned approach to care.
The Greater Choice for At Home Palliative Care initiative is comprised of four key streams, which you can learn more about below.
Workforce and community awareness Palliative Care Champion project in general practice
Aboriginal health System integration and improvement
Workforce and community awareness
Partnership with LinkWest to ensure promotion of advance care planning and facilitation of upload of completed documentation to My Health Record, delivered through the network of Neighbourhood and Community Resource Centres in areas with under-served populations in Perth North, Perth South and Country WA.
Partnership with Palliative Care WA to strengthen health literacy relating to advance care planning, palliative care, dying and grief and loss for people who have sensory loss in WA. This population includes people who are Deaf, deaf, deafblind and those with profound hearing loss due to ageing.
Palliative Care Champion project in general practice
Building GP and general practice capacity and capability to implement a consistent approach to advance care planning as part of routine health assessments for older people and those with complex chronic disease. In 2023-24, a small pilot was undertaken to test this work. The results were encouraging and have led to expansion of this work.
In 2024-25, nine general practices will be provided with a small grant to support the identification of a member of their team to undertake the role of Palliative Care Champion.
Aboriginal health
Building advance care planning and palliative care awareness and capability and capacity in Aboriginal Community Controlled Health Services.
This partnership enables promotion of culturally appropriate advance care planning and awareness of palliative care as a supportive process within routine health assessments of older Aboriginal people and those who have been diagnosed with an advanced chronic illness.
System integration and improvement
This work will be interwoven through each of the three streams described above and is aimed at improving integration of advance care planning and palliative care across the wider health system. Greater Choices will address all opportunities identified where integration between primary, acute and aged care may be strengthened.
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- Clinician Assist
A secure website provides GPs and other health professionals with guidance for assessing, managing and referring patients across Western Australia at no cost. - CareSearch
CareSearch is an Australian Government funded National Palliative Care project providing trustworthy evidence-based information and resources on palliative care. It includes support for GPs providing palliative care. - CareSearchgp App
The CareSearchgp app, is a free digital tool to support GPs to deliver palliative care. The app brings together guidance on terminal prescribing for specific symptoms and evidence-based information on key care issues. - palliAGED
palliAGED is a national online resource that provides evidence-based information, practical tools, and training to help support palliative care in aged care settings. This includes resources For GPs. - Advance Care Planning Australia
Please note that the Advance Care Planning Australia training modules are temporarily unavailable, we will make sure to update as soon as possible. - Palliative Care WA
- Palliative Care Australia
- WA Health – End of Life Care Program
- The Advance Project
- RACGP (Silver Book)
- My Health Record
- Palliative Care Outcomes Collaboration
- The Quality of Care Collaborative Australia (QuOCCA)
- CareSearch Health Practitioner education
Summarises the available learning resources—including online modules, short courses, and workforce development tools—to help health professionals build skills and confidence in providing quality palliative care. - palliAGED Training and Education
Summarises the available evidence-based training resources to help the aged care workforce build skills and confidence in delivering quality palliative care across care settings. - End-of-Life and Palliative Care Education and Training Framework (health.wa.gov.au)
- Palliative and Supportive Care Education (PaSCE)
- Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach (PEPA)
- Indigenous Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach (IPEPA)
- Gwandalan – Supporting Palliative Care for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Communities
- Palliative Care for LGBTIQ+
- Palliative Care Education and Training Collaborative
- End of Life Law for Clinicians (ELLC)
- End of Life Essentials
- Providing culturally safe end of life care for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children and young people – Palliative Care Australia
- The National Palliative Care Strategy 2018
- Aboriginal End-of-Life and Palliative Care Framework
- Helping Patients and Families Plan for an Expected Home Death: The GP’s Checklist
- Proactive Identification Guidance – Ask the Surprise Question
- Self-Care Matters
- Multilingual Resources
- Facts about morphine and other opioid medicines in palliative care
- caring@home resources
- LGBTQ+ Toolkit for Palliative Care and End of Live Decisions
- Greater Choice for At Home Palliative Care Program – Country Western Australia PHN
- Discussing Choices – Indigenous Advance Care Plans
- Palliative Care – Its more than you think
- Busting Palliative Care Myths
- Live the Life You Please
- IPEPA – Palliative Care Animated Video Series
- After Death Audit Tool (Marie Curie UK)
- What matters to me: Talking about Palliative and End-Of-Life Care
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