On Tuesday 14th May a packed programme of speakers at LOROS Hospice’s Centre for Excellence discussed the latest innovations in palliative and end of life care, to a sold out audience of healthcare professionals, carers and supporters.
The LOROS Spring Summit was the latest in a series of events to open up the charity’s work on research and education to improve care for patients and families, and to encourage greater collaboration amongst anyone with an interest in palliative care.
The day-long conference kicked off with a session on dying at home, including a moving talk from a bereaved husband and carer about his experiences. Dr Chris Williams, a local GP and lecturer at Leicester Medical School, followed with a discussion about how we can get dying at home right.
Chris said: “There’s a lot that needs to change to consistently get it right for people who want to die at home. The systems and processes need to be challenged as we know it’s not easy right now. There was a lot of passion in the room to see improvements.”
One such innovation is a pilot programme which supports people to receive ‘just in time’ medications via a pharmacy delivery service, rather than see family members hunting round pharmacies to track them down as their loved one approaches their last days.
Another key session focused on diverse communities and the challenge to deliver health equity for under-served communities. Irfhan Mururajani, who supports LOROS’s research into this area, suggests that researchers need to take every opportunity to engage with communities, making connections and building relationships as widely as possible.
“It’s so important for communities to participate and researchers can go a long way to making that happen by engaging with communities as frequently and in as many different ways as possible,” adds Irfhan.
The Summit drew to a close after a focus on the next generation of healthcare professionals, through training medical students in end of life care to LOROS’s Hospice School, a two day summer school for students age 16-18 year olds.
“It was a fascinating day, full of insight and challenge”, said Rob Parkinson, CEO of LOROS Hospice. “There was a real feeling of collaboration in the room as every person attending felt a powerful need to improve delivery, and make the experience of patients and families better.”
Watch a video of the day’s speakers here.
Find out more about our research and education teams’ work here.
