Dr. Regina McQuillan:

There is uneven development in the specialist palliative care services around the country. Currently, there are ten specialist palliative care centres providing comprehensive care with inpatient units and another 19 services which do not have inpatient units.

A new palliative policy has been drafted and is awaiting publication. I do not know what is in the policy, but assume it is a development and improvement on what we have at the moment. We need to have better services and education. The education needs to be both for people working in specialist palliative care and for all other healthcare professionals to have a better understanding of what goes on. We also need better public education so that people have a better understanding about living with life limiting illnesses and what their options are. Better research is also needed. During my time working in palliative medicine there has been improvement in some symptom management but not it in most symptoms. Funding for palliative medicine research in Ireland is minuscule. That is a big challenge.