Through Voices for Palliative Care (Voices), members of the community are advocating for better access to palliative care for patients with a life-limiting illness.
John is one of these members, who joined Voices after his wife, Jane, was referred to palliative care in the final stages of her life-limiting illness. Their experiences led John to believe that an earlier referral to palliative care would have benefitted them both.
Voices for Palliative Care is a group of people with lived experience of life-limiting illnesses, who advocate for improvements to palliative care through engagement with research and health service planning. The group encourages co-design research by providing a platform for researchers to connect with community members with lived experiences, increasing valuable input into studies, policy and service planning. Voices members are available for consultations and can be contacted for research participation. Researchers can connect with individual Voices members or the entire group, depending on the expertise and experiences required for the research, by completing the forms found here.
Voices’ focus for 2024 includes increasing public awareness on the importance of resourcing palliative care, as well as the benefits of early access to palliative care for patients and their families. They also aim to continue partnering patients and people with lived experience of palliative care with researchers, health professionals and leaders to provide informed insights on related topics.
To read more about John’s story, click here.
To learn more about Voices for Palliative Care, click here.