Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach (PEPA)
The Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach [PEPA] is a national program funded by the Australian Government Department of Health and Ageing. PEPA began in 2003 as a means of providing primary health care practitioners, from a range of disciplines, with an opportunity to undertake a clinical attachment within a specialist metropolitan or larger regional palliative care service, to develop knowledge and skills in the palliative approach. The continuing success of PEPA has seen the renewal of contracts for the 2011 – 2014 period. PEPA is managed at a national level by the Queensland University of Technology and in South Australia by the Palliative Care Council SA.
Background
The growing demand for palliative care means that increasingly health professionals are called upon to provide palliative care as a core part of their practice. This requires an informed health sector, with health care providers aware of, and committed to, the benefits that palliative care offers to people with a life-limiting disease and their families.
Palliative care is not limited to the final weeks of life. It can contribute to care decisions early in the course of any life-limiting disease and is relevant to managing symptoms in many clinical situations. PEPA aims to improve the quality, availability and access to palliative care for people who are dying and their families.
Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach (PEPA) Update
Since the first placements in 2003, feedback from participants, employers and host sites, confirms that PEPA has been an invaluable means of providing experience and skills to a wide range of health care professionals engaged in end-of-life care.
PEPA will continue to:
- Provide opportunities to ensure palliative care providers are aware of, and provide culturally appropriate palliative care and end of life support including care preferences, spiritual requirements and bereavement expression; and
- Further improve the skill and confidence of the generalist workforce to work with people with palliative care needs.
- The means by which the aim is to be achieved includes:
- building workforce capacity by facilitating clinical experience and other experiential opportunities for health practitioners across rural, remote and metropolitan settings in the palliative approach to care;
- enhancing linkages between specialist and generalist palliative care providers;
- enabling Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander health care providers to gain culturally appropriate experience in the palliative approach to care; and
- providing professional skills development opportunities for clinicians.
Target groups for PEPA 2011-2014 include:
- Aboriginal health and community professionals
- Medical practitioners
- Nurses
- Allied health professionals
- Aged care workers
- Community care workers; and
- Health professionals servicing culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) populations.
Consider what PEPA can offer you, as well as the agency in which you work and the community which you serve. The
information kit will assist and clarify the application process for those interested in a PEPA placement. Please send the completed
application form to the PEPA Project Officer at the address below.
For those applicants seeking a placement with the SA Paediatric Palliative Care Service, a police check will be required, and a consent form has been provided. The
consent for police check form will need to be sent to the Women's and Children's Hospital address located at the bottom of that form.
Click to download forms.
Project Officer
Program of Experience in the Palliative Approach (PEPA)
c/- Palliative Care Council SA
202 Greenhill Rd
EASTWOOD SA 5063
T: 08 82914137
E: pallcare@pallcare.asn.au
