Using telehealth for people at the end of life with chronic illness in Australia

Using telehealth for people at the end of life with chronic illness in Australia Research Research Using telehealth for people at the end of life with chronic illness in Australia Margaret O’Connor, Tim Moore and Yaping Zhong Abstract Background: Traditional models of palliative care have been tested by the challenges of caring for increasing numbers of people at the end stages of a chronic non-ma. [...] Results Health-related quality-of-life Of those admitted to the palliative care service Table 1 displays the RAND domain scores over the 21 months of the pilot study, there were a t ba s e l i ne , 3 and 6 months a f t e r the 35 people with chronic terminal illness; of them, telehealth programme. [...] While the uptake of advance care directives was low, it does not negate the importance of Discussion having conversations about one’s end-of-life care The telehealth programme commenced during wishes, including refusing treatment; the impact the COVID-19 pandemic, and was offered of such conversations is unknown, and may not to people with chronic illness admitted to a have been captured in a form. [...] The views of the healthcare reluctance to use new technologies (O’Connor professionals involved in service delivery of the and Moore, 2022), noting that the cohort for this project were not included, and further research pilot study had a mean age of almost 73 years. [...] Of the numbers who For the service, telehealth enabled better enrolled in the pilot study, less than half chose responsiveness to the increased demand for to participate in the quality-of-life surveys, thus homecare, especially in alleviating travel limiting the results of these surveys.