How do you know if a resident’s palliative care needs are being picked up early enough? Across dozens or hundreds of residents, it becomes harder to know whether that is happening consistently.
AIHW data shows more than one-third of deaths among older Australians occur in residential aged care. Of those who lived in residential aged care during their final year of life, 82% died there.
For some residents, that point comes relatively soon after admission. A 2024 population-based study published in the Australasian Journal on Ageing found 11% of residents died within three months of entering an aged care home and 30% within 12 months.
Many residents enter care with complex and changing health needs, so early recognition, assessment and care planning are central to palliative care in residential aged care from admission onwards.
For providers, the challenge is making sure residents’ changing needs are recognised and responded to consistently across their services.
The visibility gap in palliative care
A clinical team may know a resident well and notice when their needs change. Managers and executives have a different view, particularly when they’re responsible for multiple teams or services.
They need to know where needs are being identified early, whether practice differs between services and where staff may need more support.
Without consistent information, those patterns can be difficult to see.
Using palliative care outcomes data across the organisation
Consistent assessment and outcomes data can help providers see patterns across residents and over time. Benchmarking can show whether those patterns are isolated or point to an area that needs more attention.
That information can feed into clinical governance and continuous improvement, as well as providers’ responsibilities under the Strengthened Aged Care Quality Standards.
It can also tell leaders something about their workforce. If the same issues are appearing across a team or service, staff may need more education or support. As Hello Leaders has previously explored, leaders have a role in educating as well as managing.
There are different ways providers can build that visibility, from their own clinical governance and quality improvement processes to external programs and resources.
One option is the Palliative Aged Care Outcomes Program (PACOP), a free national program for residential aged care providers. It brings together standardised clinical assessment, workforce education, outcomes measurement, benchmarking and quality improvement.
The program helps providers recognise and respond to changing palliative care needs, build staff knowledge and confidence and use data to identify where practice could improve.
PACOPConnect is the program’s cloud-based platform, designed to streamline how participating providers collect and access PACOP data, with live reporting and interactive dashboards to help them use it.
Care teams can use the information to support clinical decisions. Managers can review trends across a service, while executives and boards can use the data as part of quality and clinical governance discussions.
Responding to gaps in end-of-life care
Identifying a gap may lead to targeted education, changes to assessment processes or closer review of a particular service.
Within PACOP, outcomes data sits alongside education and quality improvement support. If the data points to an area where staff need more knowledge or confidence, providers can make changes and continue monitoring outcomes.
For leaders, the data provides a broader view of where practice is consistent and where a service may need closer attention.
For palliative care in residential aged care, that visibility is increasingly part of the leadership role.
Find out more about PACOPConnect and participation in the PACOP program.
