What is palliative care?
Palliative care is specialized medical care for people with serious illnesses designed to improve their quality of life as well as that of their loved ones. Palliative care is provided by a team that may include doctors, nurses, social workers and advanced care practitioners such as nurse practitioners and physician assistants, working together to provide an extra layer of support. This type of care is focused on relieving the symptoms and stress caused by severe illness, helping plot out the future course of the illness and making complex medical problems easier to understand.
One way to think about palliative care is to focus on the words “quality” and “life.” This care is appropriate at any age and at any stage in a serious illness and takes place alongside treatments designed to improve the illness and prevent additional complications. Palliative care should not be considered a luxury and should be considered essential care for each person who needs it. Palliative care includes actions and tools designed to help a patient get back to “close to normal” when they're dealing with a long-term illness and remain independent for as long as possible.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), each year an estimated 56.8 million people are in need of palliative care.
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Examples of palliative care
What does palliative care look like? Palliative care is defined by “care” and not simply “comfort.” And it may look like:
- Help navigating the healthcare journey – the coordination of care plans across all healthcare settings
- Guidance and tools for managing appointments and medications, such as medication tracking tools
- Management of complex physical and emotional symptoms caused by illnesses and/or their treatments
- Helping patients with self-care and maintaining their day-to-day goals
- Assistance communicating sometimes difficult conversations and wishes regarding the future of the patient’s care
Did you know?
“Palliative care is defined by “care” and not simply “comfort.”
As you can see, the term palliative care covers a broad range of ways to assist the patient and their support team. Palliative care is often confused with other, more commonly used terms such as “hospice” and “comfort care.” It’s important to understand the differences between these two types of care.