Palliative care is such a unique and necessary part of the medical field. It essentially reflects the type of medical care involved in providing care and medical assistance to anyone who has contracted, in one way or another, a serious illness and needs a provider to aid him or her in easing the stresses and burdens of everyday life while living with an illness.
Some people incorrectly assume that palliative care is only reserved for terminal clients, but this is simply not true. While palliative medical services are incredibly useful in those situations, they are also relevant to those with any sort of prognosis. Throughout this blog, you will come to understand how important this style of care is and why the world should know more about it.
Domestic Care
There are many cases in which a person could utilize palliative care at home. Domestic services can be rendered to those who wish to stay in the comforts of their home while they live with their illness but cannot be without medical care at all. In cases such as these, palliative care fits perfectly into the person’s needs due to its focus on lifestyle, well-being, communication with other professionals, and more. Another service that palliative care can encompass is the physical labor involved in maintaining their client’s home. This might include vacuuming floors, dusting, cleaning bathrooms, and other not often thought of tasks that can greatly relieve stress for the client and their loved ones during times of illness.
Psychological Support
Palliative care professionals know just how difficult living with illness can be. A large part of their job, no matter where they are stationed in their work, is to help the client by providing psychological support. This can look like many things but tends to end with the result of the person living with illness feeling better in their mood and general atmosphere afterward. Some examples of palliative psychological support are a good conversation, honest communication, encouraging words, light humor, and more.
Symptom Management
If a person is living will illness, there is a good chance that he or she will be experiencing symptoms which he or she will need help dealing with. Palliative care can be part of that solution. Managing symptoms is crucial to the client’s overall well-being at any stage in their illness. Because different sicknesses are so varied, the management of their symptoms is also varied. This means that those treating clients in palliative care symptom management will have to be proactive in determining what each client’s unique needs are at different points. Sometimes this can look like switching medication doses, trying different medications, providing safe passage to and from bathrooms, making palatable meals, and more.
Medication Management
If a person has one illness or even more than one illness, their medicine routine may be quite complex. A palliative caregiver can provide the pharmaceutical knowledge necessary so that the person does not accidentally take medication at the wrong time, mix medications incorrectly, or try to self administer a form of medicine in a way that could cause undue harm. Managing medication can be stressful on top of all the other stress that comes with living with an illness. Palliative care can completely dissipate this stress by being there with sound judgment and safe information.
Personal Care
Sometimes during the course of a person’s illness, they may be incapacitated to handle certain daily tasks. A palliative care worker can offer help with these daunting things that need to be done. They can help the client eat, go to the restroom, clean themselves, and do whatever else the person needs help with on a day-to-day basis.
Affirming the End of Life Process
Sometimes, clients will have to come to terms with their terminal illness. In a palliative care setting, workers can offer soothing words to help the person facing this come to terms with the process. They can answer questions without any judgment, they can provide counseling to the client’s loved ones, and they can even help outline legal tasks and other logistical end-of-life processes such as funeral arrangements.
As you have read so far, palliative care offers many nuanced approaches to illness care that the standard medical field does not. While doctors need to do their job and focus on treating illness, palliative care workers can provide logistical help throughout this same process. Palliative care is a wonderful part of the medical field that anyone with illness can and should take advantage of.