Research project - Creating an intimacy support toolkit for hospice care in England (IN-TALK)
Intimacy is a core part of human well-being and often becomes particularly important at end of life.
It encompasses emotional, cognitive, and physical dimensions and is central to maintaining identity, connection, and dignity. While the NHS Ambitions for Palliative and End of Life Care (PEoLC) Framework promotes personalised and holistic care, our previous Research Capability Funded (RCF) exploratory qualitative study (2023-25) with service users (patients, partners, loved ones, bereaved), across seven hospices, suggests intimacy needs are often unaddressed.
Hospice healthcare professionals (HCPs) report lacking knowledge and confidence to initiate intimacy-related conversations, and service users report unmet needs that negatively affect emotional, spiritual, and physical wellbeing. Addressing this unmet need can help reduce distress and support appropriate use of specialist psychological services.
However, UK-based intimacy research in hospice care is limited, particularly for patients with non-cancer diagnoses, who represent over a third of hospice users.
Project lead:
Kate Sugar and Candy McCabe, Dorothy House Hospice
Local lead:
Amanda Lee, St Oswald’s Hospice
July 2026
Aim:
To co-produce an intimacy support toolkit that enables HCPs to have honest, informed, and timely intimacy needs conversations with hospice service users.
Objectives:
1. To survey:
• Hospice service users to explore their intimacy needs and priorities for support.
• Hospice HCPs to assess their confidence, current practices, and training needs in supporting intimacy.
2. To facilitate three co-production workshops with service users and HCPs to:
• Review previous qualitative exploratory findings and new survey data.
• Co-design and refine a practical intimacy support toolkit. This will likely include conversation starters, training materials, and patient stories illustrating effective intimacy support.
Mixed methods, co-production methodology.