THE hospice at Queen Margaret Hospital looks set to stay closed after NHS Fife outlined its proposals for the future of its specialist palliative care service.

The health board wants to continue the current model which would see the purpose-built hospice at Kirkcaldy's Victoria Hospital complemented with a palliative care outreach team working across Fife’s communities, care homes, hospitals and hospice.

A single inpatient hospice has been in operation in Fife since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

Between March 2020 and January 2022, the hospice was located in the grounds of the Victoria Hospital before moving temporarily to Queen Margaret Hospital to enable an extensive refurbishment of the Victoria Hospice before returning to Kirkcaldy in February.

At the time, the move back was described by Mid Scotland and Fife MSP Claire Baker as a "huge blow" and led to her launching a petition calling for the Dunfermline facility to be reopened.

Despite the pressure, NHS Fife says their plans – which will be considered by the Integration Joint Board and NHS Fife Board later this month – will widen access to specialist palliative care for people in the Kingdom.

Palliative medicine consultant Dr Jo Bowden explained: “At the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, our service had to adapt and provide a much greater balance of specialist palliative care in Fife’s communities to help keep vulnerable patients safe and away from our hospital sites.

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"These changes have proven to be hugely beneficial, both for patients and their carers, and enable us to care for far greater numbers of people than we could have previously.

“As clinicians, we want to be able to provide patients with personalised care, in a place of their choosing, whether that is at home or in a hospital. In the past, we couldn’t offer that choice, with many people unable to be cared for at home with their loved ones around them.

“Post-pandemic, we are now able to offer patients a real choice in terms of where they wish to be cared for, whether that is at home, in a care home, in hospital or hospice.”

Under the pre-COVID model of care, Fife’s Specialist Palliative Care Team could look after a maximum of 19 patients at any given time, across two hospices units at the purpose-built specialist Victoria Hospice and a hospice ward at Queen Margaret Hospital.

The move to a single hospice during the pandemic allowed specialist palliative care staff to provide outreach care in the community. The team can now care for as many as 60 patients at any time, across communities, care homes, hospitals and the hospice.

For those who are unable to, or who would prefer to be cared for in hospital or require hospice care, there continues to be access to inpatient palliative and end of life care beds in five community hospitals across Fife, including the Queen Margaret Hospital, in addition to the Victoria Hospice in Kirkcaldy.

Fife Health and Social Care Partnership’s Head of Community Care Services, Lynne Garvey, added: “We want to ensure that patients across the whole of Fife, their families and loved ones, can get access to the very best care and support possible, particularly in the final months and weeks of their life.

“It’s vitally important that we provide patients with greater choice around all aspects of their care, and we are now in a position to do this by expanding the way we deliver specialist palliative care across Fife, giving patients and families greater choice.

“The proposals will also help us better meet the needs of our population by widening and ensuring equity of access, while enabling far greater numbers of patients in Fife to receive specialist palliative care.”