APPM Special Interest Groups 

Hospice Medical Director/Medical Leads Group 
The Hospice Medical Directors/Medical Leads group has recently been set up under the leadership of Dr Christine Mott. At the inaugural meeting she said that "being a Hospice Medical Lead can be quite isolating with no large team around for support. If this group could offer support to each other that would be a useful purpose."  
The group has now met several times and will continue to meet on a quarterly basis. Their Terms of Reference are still under construction but it is likely that topics to be discussed and shared will include workforce issues, medical models, sharing difficult cases, access and management of medications, etc.  
If there are Medical Directors or Medical Leads working in a hospice who are not yet part of this group and would like to be, please contact mailto: admin@appm.org.uk for further details. 
 
The Group has been working on the production of a Sample Medication Stock List for children's hospices. Click here to access. 
Perinatal Special Interest Group 
The perinatal special interest group is co-chaired by Dr Lucinda Perkins, Consultant Neonatologist and Dr Sophie Bertaud, Consultant in Paediatric Palliative Medicine. 
The group meets quarterly with the aim of supporting and advancing the provision of high quality perinatal palliative care across the UK and Ireland through collaborative working. The group’s membership is multidisciplinary and includes representatives from perinatal teams, specialist paediatric palliative care, and the hospice sector. See our Terms of Reference here. 
 
The group played a key role in contributing to the recent BAPM Framework, ‘Recognising uncertainty: an integrated framework for palliative care in perinatal medicine’ which was published in July 2024 as a joint venture with the APPM. 
 
The group has a number of exciting goals ahead, including the development of resources for both parents and professionals. We would love to hear from APPM members who are interested in joining the group or who have suggestions for key tasks for the group to take forward. Please do get in touch via mailto: admin@appm.org.uk – we would love to hear from you! 
Research Group - Together for Short Lives and Association for Paediatric Palliative Medicine 
To further help foster academic research, Together for Short Lives and the APPM (Association of Paediatric Palliative Medicine) run a multi-disciplinary joint Research Group to help to develop a culture of research and build research capacity across the children’s palliative care sector. The group is a valuable resource for all those engaging in practice and research of children’s and young people’s palliative care. The group is chaired by Dr Emily Harrop and Dr Helena Dunbar and meets virtually three times a year. If you would like further information about this group, please contact mailto: admin@appm.org.uk for further details. 
Transition & Young Adults Special Interest Forum - Joint Forum between APM and APPM  
This subgroup started its life as a forum for adult palliative medicine physicians as part of the Association of Palliative Medicine (APM), however over the years we have established links between the APM and the APPM and in 2023 the Transition and Young adult group officially became a cross-organisational group enabling greater collaboration and understanding between our two specialties. (See Terms of Reference) 
A key role of the group is providing peer support and shared learning for all palliative health care professionals working with young adults with complex conditions. We meet online 3-4 times a year and meetings include time for learning through case discussions as well as wider conversation around education and service development at local and national levels. 
The group also acts as a hub for sharing information about national developments, training and research that have relevance to Transition. We want to ensure that both paediatric and adult palliative medicine is actively contributing to discussions around service development to address the unmet needs of this growing population. 
We would welcome any new members. Please contact mailto: admin@appm.org.uk if you would like to know more.