Dr Sarah Mills awarded Marie Curie funding for end-of-life care research
Dr Sarah Mills has been awarded funding from Marie Curie to investigate how people access healthcare services outside normal working hours during the final year of life. The project will contribute to a UK-wide programme of research aimed at improving understanding of out-of-hours care and ensuring people approaching the end of life receive appropriate support when they need it most.
The commissioned research seeks to identify the range of healthcare services used out of hours by people in their final year of life, examine how frequently different services are accessed, and explore who uses them, including variations by patient demographics and terminal conditions. The study will also investigate access to different types of out-of-hours services and identify groups who may face barriers to receiving care.
Using Scottish health data, Dr Mills and colleagues will provide an overview of patterns of out-of-hours healthcare use and analyse how patient-level factors influence the use of unscheduled care services. The findings will help build a clearer picture of end-of-life care needs and inform future service planning across the UK.
The project highlights the important role of data-driven research in understanding healthcare inequalities and improving the delivery of services for people and families at a critical stage of life.