Research
Summary of research findings
The Compassionate Communities Connector program involved volunteer Connectors supporting people living with advanced life limiting illnesses/palliative care by enlisting volunteer Caring Helpers from the community to enhance the person’s existing networks.
Research associated with the project found positive impacts on patients and carers:
- Improved social connectedness (practical and social/emotional)
- Reduced social isolation
- Increased community links
- Improved coping with daily activities
- Increased support networks
Relative to the control group, the intervention group cared for by the Compassionate Connectors were:
- 63% less likely to be admitted to hospital
- spent 77% less days in hospital
- were 44% less likely to use an Emergency Department
- and were twice as likely to use Outpatient Services.
Potential for financial savings:
$AUD 518,701 would be achieved from adopting the Connector program, assuming enrolment of 100 patients over an average 6-month participation period.
WA research
- The Compassionate Communities Connectors program: Effect on healthcare usage
- Rethinking-care-at-end-of-life-The-Compassionate-Communities-Connectors-Program
- The Compassionate Communities Connectors programme: experiences of supported families and referring healthcare providers
- Compassionate Connectors program highlights
- Supporting the dying a community responsibility
- The Compassionate Communities Connectors model for end-of-life care: implementation and evaluation
- ‘The more you give, the better it is for you. You know the reward is greater than the effort’: the Compassionate Communities Connectors’ experience
- Compassionate community connectors: a distinct form of end-of-life volunteering
- The Compassionate Communities Connectors model for end-of-life care: a community and health service partnership in Western Australia
- “We are all in this together”: Building capacity for a community-centred approach to caring, dying and grieving in Australia
Other research
- Compassionate Communities and end of life care
- Compassionate communities: end-of-life care as everyone’s responsibility
- Palliative Care the new essentials
- Reducing emergency hospital admissions: a population health complex intervention of an enhanced model of primary care and compassionate communities
- Social connection and mortality in UK Biobank: a prospective cohort analysis
The South West Compassionate Communities Network acknowledges the Noongar community as the traditional owners and custodians of Country in the South West of Western Australia and acknowledges their continuing connection to land, water and community. We pay our respects to the people, the cultures and the elders past, present and emerging.
