![FRUSTRATIONS: Slow progress on improving community palliative care is frustrating advocates. FRUSTRATIONS: Slow progress on improving community palliative care is frustrating advocates.](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/pMXRnDj3SUU44AkPpn97sC/bedbb7ba-6735-454a-86ec-0f25c090e769.jpg/r0_0_4780_3585_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
TAMWORTH’S fight for increased palliative care services in the region rages on, as local advocates ask how much the region will see of the state government’s $100 million pledge to improve end-of-life care.
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It’s been snail’s pace progress for the push to increase community-based palliative care in Tamworth, says Mitch Williams, who was spurred on to campaign for the cause following the loss of his mother, Dianne, to cancer in 2015.
It culminated in a roundtable meeting with politicians, health professionals and locals in May this year to nut out the best way forward for the region.
Since then, the state government has pledged $100 million for palliative care, as well as increased staffing in regional areas, but there’s still no plan for how the big commitment will be divvied up.
“It’s extremely frustrating,” Mr Williams told The Leader.
“The politicians are happy for a media grab, but they need to start performing.
“You’d think there would be some plan about how it would be spent.”
While Mr Williams said the budget announcements and roundtable meeting in Tamworth were “absolutely fantastic”, the slow progress continues to frustrate.
It comes after an independent audit of the state’s palliative care system recently found NSW Health’s approach to the sector was not being “effectively coordinated”.
“There is no overall policy framework for palliative and end-of-life care, nor is there comprehensive monitoring and reporting on services and outcomes,” the NSW auditor general’s report said.
“NSW Health has a limited understanding of the quantity and quality of palliative care services across the state, which reduces its ability to plan for future demand and the workforce needed to deliver it.”
NSW Health Minister Brad Hazzard said the state government’s “record spend” on palliative care came on the back of feedback from the regional roundtable meetings.
“We want the community to have confidence and choice in their end-of-life care and this Budget is a giant leap towards that outcome,” he said.
The funding included $2.4 million for six palliative care specialists in regional areas.
Parliamentary secretary for regional health, Leslie Williams, said she understood there was some frustration.
“I certainly understand there are some frustrations in the community, but we want to make sure we get it right,” the Port Macquarie MP said.
“It is taking a little longer than expected, but I make no apology for getting it right.
Ms Williams held roundtable meetings on palliative care in each regional local health district and wanted to see the respective needs of each community met, when it came to divvying-up the palliative care budget.
Responding to the auditor-general’s scathing report on the palliative care, Ms Williams said the government was aware more needed to be done.
“We’ve acknowledged the issues raised in the auditor-general’s report and we’ve already started responding to them,” she said.
Figures complied last year by advocacy found Push for Palliative found Tamworth’s community-based numbers lagged behind comparable regional counterparts.