Ageing expert awarded £600,000 to improve end of life care in UK's care homes

A University of Stirling academic has been awarded £600,000 to lead a project to improve end of life care in care homes in the UK.

The project, led by Dr Liz Forbat, an associate professor in the faculty of social sciences at the University of Stirling will focus on six specialist palliative care services in England and Scotland. The specialists will focus on helping care home residents stay out of hospital, improve symptom control for better deaths and improve care home staff capability to look after older people in care homes during their end of life.

The money was awarded to Dr Forbat's team from the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) which works in partnership with the NHS, universities and local government. The NIHR is primarily funded by the Department of Health and Social Care.

'Older people in residential care should receive the same palliative care provided in the community'

Dr Forbat, an expert in ageing and palliative care said: “Up to 50 per cent of care home residents in the UK die within six months of admission. They are often frail and have lots of complex health problems, but despite their needs, some residents don’t get access to end of life care from hospice teams, so may experience unnecessary and distressing symptoms at end of life.

“This is unjust - older people in residential care should receive the same high quality of palliative care which is provided in the community.”

This project follows the success of her Australian trial which tested a system called ‘Palliative Care Needs Rounds’ and improved access to palliative care for care home residents.

Needs Rounds involved introducing regular staff meetings to discuss residents most at risk of dying and, following a review of the person’s physical, psychological, and social wellbeing, putting a specific plan of necessary actions in place.

“Through the Australian study, we found that by introducing Needs Rounds, people died in their preferred place more often, had a better quality of death, stayed out of hospital, and care home staff felt more confident looking after them,” says Dr Forbat. “We want to explore whether Needs Rounds can be used in the UK.”

The research team includes researchers from the University of Edinburgh, Queen Margaret University, University of Leeds and University of Newcastle and will conduct interviews and run workshops to co-design with care home clinicians.

The results will be shared with care homes, residents, relatives, and GPs, as well as with specialists across the sector. The team also aims to develop an implementation package to provide all the tools and resources required to adopt UK Needs Rounds.

Dr Forbat added: “At the end of the study we hope to have produced a UK-version of Needs Rounds, and have evidence on whether it helps UK care home residents to stay out of hospital, improves symptom control for better deaths, improves staff capability to look after older people in care homes at end of life, and reduce hospital costs.”