Palliative care services in Australia

Between 2013 and 2022 (Figure 3):

• The number of employed palliative medicine physicians increased each year from 185 to 335 (an 83% increase) – a steeper increase than that observed for all employed specialist medical practitioners (an 43% increase). After accounting for population size, the FTE rate for palliative medicine physicians and all specialist medical practitioners also increased – from 0.8 to 1.2 FTE per 100,000 population for palliative medicine physicians, and from 140 to 165 FTE per 100,000 population for all specialist medical practitioners.
• In general, the number of employed palliative care nurses increased by 13% (from 3,300 to 3,700), except for declines in 2017 and 2021 (1.1% and 7.4% decrease, respectively). Over the same period, the number of all employed nurses and midwives increased by 26% (from 295,000 to 373,00). The pattern for FTE rate per 100,000 population was broadly consistent with that observed for the number of these palliative care nurses and all nurses and midwives.
• The growth in the number of professionals was steeper for females than males both in palliative medicine physicians (108% increase in females vs 48% increase in males) and all specialist medical practitioners (86% vs 26% increase). Conversely this growth was steeper for males than females both in palliative care nurses (41% increase in males vs 11% increase in females) and all nurses and midwives (44% vs 24% increase).
• The average number of total hours worked per week declined gradually for palliative medicine physicians – from 39 hours to 36 hours. However, for palliative care nurses the average hours worked increased slightly (from 32 hours to 34 hours) over the same period.

Figure 3: Trends in employed palliative medicine physicians and palliative care nurses, 2013–2022