Miss Nicole Dalziel1
1Grampians Health, Horsham, Australia
Biography:
Nicole Dalziel has recently completed her fourth year of Occupational Therapy studies at Deakin University, following a placement with Barwon Health’s Community Palliative Care team. She has been employed as a grade one occupational therapist within the Community Occupational Therapy team at Grampians Health in Horsham, Victoria, where she has developed a strong interest in palliative care and optimising person-centred practice. Nicole’s project focused on validating modifications to the IPOS to strengthen patient voice within Barwon Health’s Community Palliative Care clinic. This reinforces the importance of holistic, patient-led care throughout everyone’s healthcare journey.
Abstract:
Background:
The Community Palliative Care (CPC) service at Barwon Health Geelong, provides an interdisciplinary outpatient clinic for ambulatory patients. This clinic is led by a nurse practitioner and includes interdisciplinary services such as occupational therapy, social work, dietician and physiotherapy. Prior to attending the CPC clinic, patients complete an electronic Integrated Palliative Care Outcome Scale (IPOS) via REDCap Survey. The IPOS provides information on symptoms and psychosocial concerns the patients may experience. The IPOS outcomes are reviewed face to face with nurse practitioner during clinic appointment. This information guides discussion regarding symptom management, goal planning and identifying referrals to the interdisciplinary team. Team members identified that responses on these surveys were symptom focussed and failed to give a sense of the whole person and what was important to them. The IPOS was modified with two open ended additional questions; “What matters to you?” and “What would you like to be able to do in the next few weeks/months?”
Aims:
This project evaluates the effect of adding two additional questions to the standard IPOS to identify holistic patient needs and preferences.
Methods:
A literature review was completed on current use of IPOS in practice. IPOS data was collected and sorted into themes. Semi structed interviews and a survey was conducted with staff to obtain perceptions on effectiveness of the additional questions.
Results:
Comparison of 165 IPOS surveys indicated that the additional two questions enhanced the patient voice. 82.8% of patients were able to identify holistic, person-centred preferences, in addition to symptom concerns.
Conclusions:
Implementing the modified IPOS resulted in a shift in patient’s responses from mainly symptom focussed to identifying patient’s preferences and goals. This has resulted in enhanced person-centred planning in community palliative care.