What do residential aged care facility policies say about palliative care and dying?

This paper is a discussion of one part of a larger study that undertook a discourse analysis of aged and palliative care policy documents, aimed at addressing the influence of palliative care policy on care of the dying in aged care facilities. Despite commonalities, there has been little analysis of the intersection between aged and palliative care in policy; so the study (undertaken during period 2000-mid 2001) examined documents to ascertain the place of care of the dying. Commonalties in documentation were found, but also variation in content and emphasis. Overall, there is developing discourse about dying in this context, which will be further enhanced by Commonwealth Government initiatives and assist in policy development for accreditation requirements.