Recommendation 6

HM Government · verbatim extract Not Addressed

Accept We know that having 24/7 access to palliative care and end-of-life care support benefits patients, families and healthcare professionals who do not have that specialist experience and expertise. Specific guidelines on 24/7 palliative care and end-of-life care services are already available via NHS England’s statutory guidance which already makes specific reference to commissioners defining how their services will meet population needs 24/7, and includes a priority action for ensuring that staff, patients and carers can access the care and advice they need, whatever time of day. We will be refreshing this guidance later this year. Additionally, NICE guidance on end-of-life care for adults includes recommendations about 24/7 access to care. It recommends that adults approaching the end of their life should have access to an out-of-hours end of life care advice line and a healthcare professional available 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, who can access the person’s records and advance care plan, and make informed decisions about changes to care. Although NICE guidance is not mandatory, there is an expectation that commissioners and service providers take the guidelines into account when making decisions about how to best meet the needs of their local communities. We are committed to publishing an MSF to improve the access, quality and sustainability of all-age palliative care and end-of-life care in line with the 10 Year Health Plan, and 24/7 provision has been identified an area of action that can help to achieve our goal of improving palliative care and end-of-life care for all by reducing A&E attendances, non-elective admissions and bed days in last 90 days of life. Furthermore, through our work on neighbourhood health, we will set out how evidence-based models can be adopted and scaled.