Palliative Care Services

Ms CLANCY (Elder) (14:41): My question is to the Minister for Health and Wellbeing. Can the minister please update the house on state government initiatives to increase South Australians' access to palliative care services?

The Hon. C.J. PICTON (Kaurna—Minister for Health and Wellbeing) (14:42): I thank the member for Elder for her interest and her passion in terms of palliative care in South Australia. This is a very important issue. I think we all have to properly understand that death is a part of life and how we die and the manner in which our loved ones die is incredibly important. There are some people who receive excellent palliative care here in South Australia and across the country, and there are some people who do not. We need to make sure that we maximise the ability for everybody to have a good palliative care journey, and we are delivering that.

One of the things that I was very excited about last week was down at Adelaide Oval where we had the first step of our Ambulance Wish program. This is a program that SA Health is partnering and kickstarting with a contribution of $250,000. We are working with Palliative Care SA and St John to enable people who are in palliative care to have a wish. We were at Adelaide Oval because Simon, who is in palliative care in the north-eastern suburbs, unfortunately has cancer but had a wish of going to Adelaide Oval for one last pie and beer with his mates. Thanks to this work and this program, that has been able to be delivered. Simon was able to come down there and it was a really touching moment where you could just sense the incredible joy he felt of seeing his name up on the scoreboard at Adelaide Oval. It was an incredibly touching moment, not just for him but for his family members as well.

Of course, that is one example of what we can do in palliative care and that is now a program that is going to be rolling out across South Australia, enabling more and more people to have their wish fulfilled. We have seen this program working internationally and nationally and now it is here in South Australia, which I am incredibly delighted about.

In addition to that, we are doing a lot more. Just before question time today, we had a function a number of members were at, which the Minister for Human Services and I spoke at, bringing together volunteering organisations in South Australia and Palliative Care SA, because next week is both Volunteering Week and Palliative Care Week, and there is a close connection between the two. We are doing work at the moment with our Palliative Care Connect program, which is helping to support volunteers in palliative care who play a key role in the community, and this was highlighting that.

In addition to that, we are rolling out more palliative care nurses across South Australia and this was part of our election commitment for 300 additional nurses across the state. We have now seen those 10 FTE of palliative care nurses delivered to regional South Australia and that is a 45 per cent increase, in terms of the palliative care nurses that we have had dedicated to regional South Australia, which is enabling a lot more families to get the support that they need. I was able to just meet Andrea, who is one of those nurses now based in Murray Bridge and helping families on that palliative care journey, whereas otherwise they would not have got the support that they needed.

Another element of this, that we have delivered as part of our election commitments, is helping community pharmacies to be able to stock the palliative care drugs that people need in the community, that otherwise might have meant that they couldn't be supported in the community and might have had to go to hospital for that care. It is a small investment which has enabled a lot of families to get the help that they need.

Of course, we are doing broader work with Palliative Care Connect, which is enabling many thousands of calls, 2,500 calls, for people who are seeking assistance and need to be connected to the right services. So thank you to Palliative Care SA. This is really important for all South Australians.