Developing hospice care over a distance in highland Scotland: a knowledge exchange process

This paper describes a piece of collaborative research that aimed to develop an implementation plan for a virtual hospice. The aim of the virtual hospice in this case is to extend the reach of hospice facilities provided by the Highland Hospice in Inverness, Scotland. We chose a knowledge exchange process that included Hospice staff at every step. We began with a workshop that scoped out all of the potential virtual hospice services, which were condensed into a core set of five services. We then conducted interviews with selected Hospice staff. The final step involved presenting our recommendations to the Hospice, including a storyboard of how the virtual hospice might operate in practice. We took the Hospice's feedback and incorporated it into a final report. Overall, we feel that the knowledge exchange process generated a more accurate and realistic implementation plan.