Palliative care services in England: a survey of district nurses' views

Good access to health and social services is essential to enable palliative care patients to remain and die at home. This article reports on a survey of perceptions of availability of such services by district nursing teams (651 respondents) across eight cancer networks in England. Only just over half of respondents thought GP home visits and specialist palliative care assessment were always available. Many district nurses reported, at best, only sometimes being able to access inpatient palliative care beds, respite care, Marie Curie/night sitting services or social work assessment. Wide variation in access to all services was reported between cancer networks. Equitable provision of services is essential if more patients are to be cared for and die at home, but our results indicate considerable room for improvement. Primary care trusts, cancer networks and strategic health authorities must work together to ensure minimum standards of access nationally if the recommendations of the NICE guidance on supportive and palliative care are to be achieved.