PALLIATIVE CARE
What is Palliative Care?
Palliative Care is patient and family-centered care that optimizes quality of life by anticipating, preventing and treating suffering. It is intended to be delivered concurrently alongside other treatments, services and primary care. Palliative care is not about dying. It is about living well until the very last moment.
The Danny Sklar Palliative Care Program includes:
- Discussion with the patient and family members about goals of care and helping in making sure that those goals are documented.
- Management of pain and other symptoms. Avoiding hospitalizations and unnecessary MD office visits.
- Palliative care specialists provide assistance in making sure patients understand how to use their medications.
- Communication about medical conditions and what to expect as those conditions progress
- Emotional support for patients and family caregivers from specially trained social workers
- Help coordinating care delivered by all your providers and as you move from one setting to another (communicating with them how things stand with symptoms and your evolving goals of care).
- Referrals to community resources for assistance with social and practical needs (medical supply stores, meal delivery programs, peer support groups)
- Spiritual support
- Bereavement services for families
The Danny Sklar Palliative Care Program is a service of Weinstein Hospice. Click here to read about Danny Sklar and how his goal to create a worthy legacy for his family resulted in a unique program that serves generations of people battling serious illness.
Who Is Appropriate for Palliative Care?
- Patients who are pursuing aggressive treatment for cancer, heart disease and pulmonary disease including but not limited to; chemotherapy, radiation and dialysis.
- Patients and families making end-of-life decisions about advance directive issues and goals of care
- Patients experiencing difficult symptom management.
Services Provided
- Symptom management
- Medication management
- Collaborate with your team of doctors and nurses
- Nurse Practitioner visits
- Prevent emergency room visits or hospitalizations
- Transition from aggressive measures to comfort-based
Anticipated Outcomes of Palliative Care
- Primary Impact is on the patient
- Management of pain and other symptoms
- Clarification of prognosis and goals of care
- Care is provided where the patient resides
- Secondary impact is on those around the patient
- Family – less confused, more satisfied, better coping
- Nurses, doctors – appreciate in-home in-person assessments of the patient
