Discharge Community Link Nurses

Discharge Community Link Nurse, Caroline Boyer, with patient, Ethel.

There are a number of factors leading to delays in discharge for palliative care patients, which can mean they spend their final days in hospital when their wish is to die at home.

The Discharge Community Liaison Nurses, appointed as part of the Lincolnshire project, provide a communication link between the hospital and providers of care in the community to accelerate the discharge of palliative care patients. They coordinate packages of home care, provide support and advice to patients and their carers, communicate patient needs to community healthcare teams and, if necessary, accompany patients home and help them get settled.

In their first two years in post, the two Discharge Community Link Nurses discharged 715 patients out of hospital to another place of care. For those patients whose preferred place of care was home, 72% of patients were actually discharged home.