Palliative Care – Partners in Caring

It is a community based palliative care service offering health care and emotional support to patients and their carers living with life limiting illnesses. Our focus is to offer a service that will enhance a person’s dignity and independence. Geographically, the service overrides three rural boundaries, these being the Ararat Rural City, Northern Grampians Shire and the Pyrenees Shire. The service is offered 5 days per week, excluding weekends and public holidays, between the hours of 8:30 am to 5:00 pm. and additional support provided by a telephone after hours service

Our aim is to work with patients, their families and carers to achieve a level of care that optimises an individual’s quality of life. The service liaises with a variety of local health and community services to assist in personal care, symptom management, home help and transport. Staff work with the local GP, local hospital, District Nursing, Bush Nursing Centre, Occupational Therapist, Physiotherapist, Stoma Therapist, Social Worker, Dietician, Shire Council Workers, Oncology and Radiation Therapist. The service also has access to the Regional Palliative Care Team, working closely with Palliative Care Specialists, Nurse Practioners and Physicians.

Central Grampians Palliative Care also loans a wide variety of equipment and aids to enable independence to be maintained for as long as possible and home nursing care easier. The service is available to any person living in the region where palliative care rather than curative treatment is the appropriate care of choice. Patients can self-refer, or referrals can be made by anyone involved with the patient in association with the patient’s own doctor and the patient’s permission.

Over the past 12 months, Central Grampians Palliative Care Services has continued to provide care to those members in the community facing a life limiting and/or terminal illness. It has built on its relationships with many other health providers and Doctors to ensure that the appropriate health care is delivered in a timely and professional manner.

Central Grampians Palliative Care is a member of the Grampians Region Palliative Care Consortium which has developed a plan for how services are to be delivered across the region. This consortium meets monthly to work towards the implementation of  the Department of Health Policy: Strengthening Palliative Care, policy and strategic directions 2011-2015