Advance Care Planning (ACP) Quality Implementation (AQI) Knowledge Exchange Platform

Platform Lead: Dr Raymond Ng Han Lip (Co-chair, National Advance Care Planning Steering Committee; Chief, Palliative & Supportive Care, Department of Integrated Care, Woodlands Health (WH); Visiting Consultant, GERI)

Platform Co-Lead: Dr Tan Woan Shin (Deputy Director, Research and Scientist, GERI)

Key Collaborating Organisations:

Core Team: AIC and GERI

National Workgroup: Alexandra Hospital, Changi General Hospital, GERI, KK Women’s and Children’s Hospital, Khoo Teck Puat Hospital (KTPH), Lien Centre for Palliative Care at Duke-NUS Medical School, National Cancer Centre Singapore, National Heart Centre Singapore, National University Polyclinics, Ng Teng Fong General Hospital, Singapore General Hospital (SGH), SingHealth Polyclinics, Tan Tock Seng Hospital (TTSH)

Pilot Sites: Six pilot teams from KTPH, SGH, TTSH, WH

Gap: Singapore’s ACP 2.0 evaluation highlighted a lack of endorsed implementation consensus and guidelines at the national level, which has resulted in inconsistency and varying standards of ACP practices across settings.

Solution: Through the AQI Platform, GERI co-led the creation of the following:

1) a national implementation for ACP practitioners and healthcare professionals,

2) an implementation action plan for pilot sites, and

3) quality indicators to measure the success of ACP implementation.

GERI supported the national workgroup in their adoption of implementation science approaches in the development and testing of strategies to overcome barriers to implementation. The Agency for Integrated Care (AIC) and GERI also co-led an ACP World Café with stakeholders.

Anticipated Impact: The national guidelines were presented to and endorsed by the ACP National Steering Committee, while ACP Quality Improvement initiatives were also shared with the Committee. The guidelines will guide ACP leaders, trainers, facilitators, administrators and clinicians to enhance ACP quality and quality of care which benefits clients including older persons. It will be subsequently adopted by AIC to guide workstreams and users under the ACP plan. The guidelines will be launched as shared resources by AIC to target users such as ACP leaders, trainers, facilitators, administrators, community care partners and AIC’s Quality Improvement Division.

Funding: Co-funded by AIC and GERI

Duration: Apr 2022 to Mar 2025