Palliative care week a time to remember

AN event to mark National Palliative Care Week was held by Bendigo Health on Wednesday that included a scattering of the ashes ceremony on Wednesday.

Conducted at the Specialist Palliative Care and Evaluation Unit the ashes came from burnt messages written to deceased loved at Bendigo Marketplace at Christmas.

Bendigo Health’s manager of specialist palliative care Alison Smith said the goal for National Palliative Care Week was to spur on conversations around end of life.

“This year is based around trying to encourage people to talk about death and dying,” she said. “What you want, what your choices are, where you want to be, what treatments do you want?

“It’s about planning for your end-of-life care, making sure that pretty much everybody, your family in particular, knows what you want.”

Ms Smith said the week was also about acknowledging the people who work in the field.

“We’re also celebrating the wealth of knowledge and experience within our workforce,” she said. “Which are the health professionals and the volunteers.

“We have doctors and nurse practitioners that will help someone live the best life they can however long is left by good symptom management.

“Obviously, medical doctors are trained in palliative medicine as the nurses are, but they need to be a special kind of person.

“That’s someone who will listen, someone, that patients can feel really relaxed and comfortable with and somebody who really knows what they’re talking about.”

Ms Smith said the scattering ceremony had become an important service at Bendigo Health for the loved ones of patients.

“It’s something we’ve done for a while now,” she said. “We’ve got people that come every year, they have had loved ones die here and are well known at the service.”