Rapid Palliative Care In-Reach for COVID-19 (RaPIC)

The RaPIC program is provided through the RAPID team, a multidisciplinary palliative care team that looks to provide gap-fill palliative care interventions upon discharge to a residential care facility. This includes medical, nursing and psychosocial care. Participants have access to RaPIC as it is a pre-existing service. The recruitment will be purposive sampling targeting residents and families who have received support through the service. Participants will take part in a semi-structured qualitative interview. Following participation in the interview encounter, participants will be offered and provided follow-up support for any unmet concerns or needs relating to their health care. Any information of concerns that arise during the period of follow-up care will not be part of data collection. From a qualitative perspective, the focus of the interviews will consider how awareness of the COVID-19 pandemic's impact on the aged care system influences participants perceptions of palliative and end-of-life care in aged care facilities. In the event, that there is further community transmission, the qualitative interview will consider the unique needs of COVID-19 positive residents and their families. The interviews will be completed by a research social worker, conducted face to face, via telephone or video conferencing depending on participant preference. The duration of the interview will vary depending on participant comfort, and the depth and scope of information participants are willing to share. We estimate the interviews will take between 30 minutes to 2 hours.