Access to home palliative care services in Italy: the experience of the ‘SAMOT Onlus’ home care unit

Abstract

There have been significant advances in accessing the benefits of palliative care for incurable illness. However, there are disparities in access to palliative care (PC), with the majority of services being offered by non-profit organizations (NPOs). In this short letter, we describe the PC services provided by SAMOT, which is a NPO operating in Sicily, Southern Italy. In 2014, the World Health Assembly Resolution on PC claimed to incorporate PC services into every health care system [1]. Briefly, PC can be described as a multidisciplinary approach with the goal to relieve the suffering of people with life-limiting illnesses and their families by the comprehensive assessment and treatment of physical, psychosocial, and spiritual symptoms [1,2]. Historically, PC services have focused on patients with incurable cancer, but the current view is that access to PC should be based on need rather than diagnosis [3]. Unfortunately, in many health care systems in Europe, PC services are not yet available to all patients with serious incurable diseases. In Sicily, the biggest island of Southern Italy with about 5 million inhabitants, a service of home PC (SAMOT onlus) was introduced in the 1980s with the goal of providing a comprehensive PC approach for people suffering from incurable diseases (and to their caregivers). SAMOT provides its PC services in five out of the nine regional areas of Sicily. In this short letter we describe the situation in the Palermo district. Our home PC services may be required by persons: