What Is Palliative Care
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- What Is Palliative Care
Palliative Care
What Is Palliative Care
Palliative care is an approach that improves the quality of life of patients (adults and children) and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification and correct assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, whether physical, psychosocial or spiritual. Palliative care, is fundamental to improving quality of life, well-being, comfort and human dignity for individuals.
Palliative Care Principles
- Provides relief from pain and other distressing symptoms
- Will enhance the quality of life, and will also positively influence the course of illness;
- Integrates the psychological and spiritual aspects of patient care;
- Offers a support system to help patients live as actively as possible until death;
- Offers a support system to help the family cope during the patient’s illness and in their bereavement;
- Uses a team approach to address the needs of patients and their families, including bereavement counselling, if indicated;
- Affirms life and regards dying as a normal process;
- Intends neither to hasten or postpone death;
- Is applicable early in the course of illness, in conjunction with other therapies that are implemented to prolong life, such as chemotherapy or radiation therapy, and includes those investigations needed to better understand and manage distressing clinical complications”.