Access to Palliative Care in India
Status: Ongoing
Topic Tags: palliative care, India
SDG Tags: Good Health and Well-being
Scope: India
Sponsors: None
ASAR Members involved: Parth Sharma, Vidhi Wadhwani, Gaurav Urs, Padmavathy Krishna Kumar
Collaborators: Pallium India
Summary
Approximately 7-10 million people require palliative care services in India every year. However, less than 4% of this population has access to it. While palliative care models from Kerala are followed globally, other states still have miles to cover in making palliative care accessible to its people.
Pallium India is an NGO in Trivandrum, Kerala, which aims to make quality palliative care and effective pain relief accessible to everyone. ASAR has collaborated with Pallium India to understand the inequity in access to palliative care at the state and district levels. Pallium India maintains a directory of all active palliative care centres in India and the services provided by those centres. Using this data, we assess the time taken to reach the nearest palliative care centre.
Research Aims
To assess the time taken to reach the nearest palliative care centre at the state and district level and identify locations for new centres.
Advocacy Aims
We aim to provide an evidence-based solution to the lack of palliative care centres by proposing ideal locations for new centres that would improve the accessibility of palliative care services and ultimately improve the quality of life of people with end-stage diseases.