CALD access to palliative care
A new project, the Culturally Responsive Palliative Care Community Education, was launched last week. The Victorian government provided Palliative Care Victoria with $400,000 funding through the Strengthening Palliative Care policy to work with multicultural organisations to raise awareness and access to palliative care for people with a Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) background.
A new project, the Culturally Responsive Palliative Care Community Education, was launched last week.
The Victorian government provided Palliative Care Victoria with $400,000 funding through the Strengthening Palliative Care policy to work with multicultural organisations to raise awareness and access to palliative care for people with a Culturally and Linguistically Diverse (CALD) background.
“In celebrating diversity, the Coalition government also recognises we have to ensure we provide services that meet people’s different needs,” says Minister for Health, David Davis.
“We know that almost 24% of Victorians were born overseas, however people from CALD backgrounds only account for 7% of palliative care clients.
“We need to address this imbalance, and one way of doing this is by raising community awareness of death and end-of-life care, including palliative care,” he says.
Evidence tells us that applying best practice approaches to health promotion and peer education within CALD communities is an effective way of raising awareness, Minister Davis claims.
The Culturally Responsive Palliative Care Community Education project will engage with the Chinese, Italian, Maltese, Turkish and Vietnamese communities.
“It’s important people from CALD backgrounds are accessing specialist palliative care appropriate to their needs at the right time, in the place of their choice,” Minister Davis says.
“We know people’s cultural needs are supported once they have accessed palliative care.
“Our challenge is to improve the information about where people can enquire about palliative care and have information on hand describing the care options available.”
