THE CHIEF executive of the Irish Hospice Foundation has hit out at the “postcode lottery” for those with terminal conditions.
Eugene Murray said there were large differences between regions in the care that is available to people at the end of their lives and suffering from terminal cancer, heart or respiratory conditions.
The Government could make significant improvements to services at no additional cost to the exchequer, he said. It was “not a problem about money and not a problem about policy, it’s a problem of implementation”.
He said many hospitals had terminal cancer patients occupying acute beds needlessly and these patients could be treated from a hospice care facility, or at home.
This would cost the State less and provide better care, he said.Taking the example of cancer patients in the midwest, which he said had good quality hospice services, over 70 per cent of those who died from cancer did so at home or in a hospice. But in 12 counties in the southeast, northeast and midlands, 70 per cent died in a hospital.
Patients are “being treated in an environment that does not recognise what stage they are at,” he said. “Almost all of the inpatients occupying cancer beds in our hospitals are palliative care patients who can be moved into hospice care.”
When inpatient hospice care beds are provided, patients “have a pathway out of the hospital system into a comprehensive palliative care service”.
This is because inpatient hospice care beds, and the associated facilities, can also support hospice care at home, which Mr Murray said was “what most people want”.
Mr Murray described Government plans to fund 200 new beds in hospices around the country as “a drop in the ocean” compared to the 45,000 publicly funded beds in hospitals and nursing homes. Some of these beds should be turned into hospice care beds, he said.
The foundation strongly believes that improved hospice services could be provided without any additional cost to the government, Mr Murray said.
He said one of the factors stopping the reorganisation he was calling for from being brought about is that “communities and political parties never like to see a ward close”.
There has to be some give on reorganisation, he said.
The foundation believes that the creation of inpatient beds, and the associated facilities, enable many more patients to receive care in the community, when directly compared with acute hospital services.
Yesterday marked the launch of the foundation’s annual coffee morning, to raise funding for home hospice care.
It will take place on Thursday, September 16th, and all funds raised will go to local hospice services.
Information packs can be obtained from the Irish Hospice Foundation by calling 01-679 3188.