Early analysis of Palliative Care Australia’s recent national workforce survey points to the next steps in Australia’s health and aged care reform journey.  

“We had an extraordinary result with 1400 surveys completed. The response is even more extraordinary when you consider the pressures health professionals and volunteers who work in this space are under,” says Josh Fear, National Policy Director, Palliative Care Australia (PCA).  

“Thank you to everyone who made time to share what they know from that grassroots level; your insights are rich and deep and are valuable as the next round of reforms are worked through with government.” 

Sectors represented in the 1400 respondents: 

• Specialist palliative care 53% 
• Aged care 18% 
• Primary care 9% 
• Other health settings 10% 
• Volunteers 10% 

“We were also able to achieve a good geographic representation, which will give us usable data at a state and territory level,” Mr Fear says. 

“Our respondents are people who know and understand health systems and how they work and don’t work with 30% of respondents having 10 to 19 years’ experience, and a further 24% having 20 or more years’ experience in palliative care.” 

The aim of the survey, which was launched in May during National Palliative Care Week and stayed open until mid-August, was to explore access to palliative care in primary care and aged care, demand for palliative care services, access to after-hours care, workforce wellbeing, and the impact of voluntary assisted dying.  

Results of early analysis point to the need for: 

• Improved access to palliative care through primary care - making sure we are sufficiently rewarding GPs to undertake this crucial work  
• Improved access to palliative care through aged care – where we need to ensure that the major reforms across the sector are also delivering quality palliative care to those who need it. 
• Improved access to palliative care for people under 65 – including access to basic community/at home care for people with disabilities linked to terminal conditions who cannot access the NDIS. 

“Each of these areas will be important to Palliative Care Australia’s advocacy in the lead up to the Federal Election, where we are seeking commitments from those who might form government,” Mr Fear says. 

“This data is a really powerful policy and advocacy tool that will empower the next chapters of reform and our mission to improve access to palliative care.” 

The ‘Survey of the National Palliative Care Workforce Across Health and Aged Care Settings’ was conducted in partnership with Winton Research and Insights. Future reports and findings will be released via the PCA website. Subscribe to our fortnightly eNewsletter to stay up to date.