Development of Scottish palliative care clinical guidelines

1. Camilla Dawson1,
2. Paul Baughan2 and
3. David Gray3

+ Author Affiliations

1. ¹Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Centre, Glasgow, UK
2. ²Dollar Health Centre, Dollar, Clackmannanshire, UK
3. ³ACCORD Hospice and Royal Alexandra Hospital, Paisley, UK

1. Correspondence to Dr Camilla Dawson, Beatson West of Scotland Cancer Centre, 24 Morley Street, Flat 3/2, Glasgow G42 9JB, UK; camilladawson1@nhs.net

In the autumn of 2014 Scotland's first national guidelines for palliative care will become available online.

These guidelines have been developed for use by all healthcare professionals involved in the provision of palliative care to those with a life-limiting illness. The primary goal of these guidelines is to improve care by minimising inconsistencies in clinical practice through the provision of practical and readily usable, evidence-based or best-practice guidance on a range of common clinical issues. 

The guidelines are an outcome of The Scottish Governments’ national palliative care action plan ‘Living and Dying Well; Building on Progress’, published in 2011, which recommended that ‘all Health Boards should have guidance in palliative care on identified topic areas and that National Health Service (NHS) Healthcare Improvement Scotland (HIS) will work with Health Boards and the Scottish Partnership for Palliative Care (SPPC) to agree a national guideline in each topic area and a mechanism for reviewing and updating its content’. This recommendation was further informed by a previous …

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