UK Claims Top Spot as Best Place to Die
In a study of end-of-life care services across 80 countries, conducted by the Economist Intelligence Unit, UK has been ranked as the best in the world. UK was followed by Australia and New Zealand, who ranked second and third respectively in this elaborate study. BBC reported these findings. UK scored a 93.9 on 100, while Australia and New Zealand scored 91.6 and 87.6 respectively.
The study highlights that the integration of palliative care into the National Health Service (NHS), strong hospice movement largely funded by the charitable sector, the specialized staff and deep community engagement are few of the key factors that contributed towards UK topping the list, reports The Guardian.
According to BBC, the 3 worst countries for end-of-life care are Iraq, Bangladesh and the Philippines. Their scores are 12.5, 14.1 and 15.3 on 100, respectively.
The rankings were a result of a set of assessments carried out. The evaluations were based on the quality of the hospitals, the quality of the hospice environments, the number of staff, how skilled the staff where, the affordability factor of care provided and overall quality of care. What is quite disheartening is that only 34 of the 80 countries assessed provided commendable care that could be classified as a good end-of-life care. This means only 15% of the entire adult population in these 80 countries where at the advantage of receiving quality hospice care, states BBC.
