Where and how would you want to spend your last 1000 days?

Premila Fade is a Geriatrician with an interest in medical ethics and end of life care. Here she discusses BGS’s Living and Dying Well with Frailty event which was held on 6 March in London. She tweets @premzf 

If you were an older person living with frailty where and how would you want to spend your last 1000 days?  It is often difficult to accurately predict prognosis for older adults living with frailty and they have different needs at the end of life to younger people.  Traditional models of specialist palliative care do not always meet these needs or those of the carers and family supporting them.

What makes frailty different from other conditions at the end of life is that there can be prolonged periods of relative stability and then a potentially mild illness/insult causes a significant or catastrophic deterioration. This acute deterioration often triggers the conventional response to crisis – 999, ambulance to ED, investigations and the commencement of invasive medical treatment.