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There is a need to improve access to and experiences of palliative care for people who use alcohol and other drugs when faced with terminal medical conditions. Effective harm reduction interventions mean that people who use alcohol and other drugs are living longer, and continue to use substances as older individuals. People who use drugs demonstrate high levels of resilience in the face of a lifetime of structural disadvantage and exclusion, but are still more likely to die at an earlier age than the general population. They also experience accelerated age‐related declines in functioning compared with non‐drug using persons of similar age, and often have complex care needs due to accumulated health effects from their substance use and a high prevalence of past trauma. The provision of palliative care to people who use drugs can be challenging for clinicians, specifically how to manage pain, anxiety and distress among these individuals. Person‐centred care is often obstructed by policies that make generalisations about the risks associated with the use of alcohol and other drugs while receiving medical care. Clinicians and health services looking to improve access to palliative care should integrate the perspectives of people with lived and living experience of drug use into their person‐centred care and explore opportunities for the harms of stigma to be minimised. 

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Authors: Grace FitzGerald, Jon Cook, Peter Higgs, Charles Henderson, Sione Crawford and Thileepan Naren

Article Type: Perspective