Challenges to the use of hospice services: A cultural perspective

Abstract

Background: Ministry of Health information provided through a GAP analysis identified hospices as facing access-to-care pressure for Maori, Pacific and Asian patients. Aim: This project sought to identify challenges to hospice service access for Maori, Pacific and Asian patients. Method: 52 qualitative interviews were completed with 37 cancer patients (Maori, Pacific, Asian), whanau/family, bereaved whanau/family, 15 health professionals (e.g. referring GPs, allied health professionals) within one district health board. Results: Challenges to service utilisation included: lack of information based on language barriers, a mistrust of the health system and cultural differences between the communities served and the suppliers of health services. Conclusion: The absence of shared cultural scripts can create challenges to hospice service access. The findings highlight the importance of patient and family cultural and psycho-social support as well as increased knowledge of hospice to utilisation of services. This information can be used for future planning to enable hospice to both provide high quality evidence based palliative care services for patients and families and provide consultative services to primary health care providers in the community.