Due to aging population and an increasing number of patients with terminal illness, palliative and end-of-life care has lately become an important topic of concern in Hong Kong recently. In view of the concern over respect to patient self-determination and improvement of their quality of life at the terminal stage, the government will implement the legislative proposal of advance directives and dying in place in this year. To equip the sector with knowledge of the related topics and its impacts on palliative and end-of-life care service development, the Council publishes “Newsletter on Palliative and End-of-Life Care Service”.
The fourth issue of the newsletter is “Advance Care Planning: For Now and For the Future in Northern Ireland” (only Chinese version) is hereby issued to introduce the Advance Care Planning in Northern Ireland regarding its developmental background, its co-creative element, its wide scope of conversation, as well as adopting an innovative way to promote Advance Care Planning etc. Finally, some key observations will be highlighted.