This submission responds to the Department of Health’s Nurse Practitioner 10 Year Plan Consultation Paper.  Palliative Care Nurse Practitioners (NPs) are a highly valuable and important part of the palliative care workforce and support palliative care patients across the lifespan from paediatric to ageing adults. The palliative care sector would benefit from an increase in NPs to expand the delivery of palliative care services and support the current palliative care workforce. Palliative Care NPs are ideally positioned to take the lead in caring for people with diverse needs and enable equitable access to palliative care given their ability to work across care settings and across all locations.  They are also an important part of ensuring that palliative care is core business in aged care.  Palliative Care NPs need appropriate resourcing and support to enable optimal care to people who are palliative including changes in MBS rebates to support longer consultations, services in aged care, out of hours and emergency care, medication reviews and telehealth consultations.  They can be further supported through a review of the current collaborative arrangement requirements, support for registered nurses to upskill to become NPs and increased public and health sector awareness of the role and work of NPs.

PCA submission on the Nurse Practitioner 10 Year Plan - November 2021