What is palliative care?
Palliative care describes the physical, psychological, spiritual and social aspects of care and support given to individuals who are living with an illness or disease that cannot be cured. This could be either cancer or non-cancer diagnosis.
The health professionals caring for you, will offer to talk to you and anyone else you would like to be involved in your care, about what this means for you.
The aim is to help you manage symptoms such as pain, breathlessness and nausea along with other issues which relate to you, as well as improving your quality of life and supporting your family/carers.
What is end of life care?
You may hear the term end of life care. This is care for people who are considered to be in the last year of life. It can be difficult to foresee when this is as it very much depends on each individual and their underlying health condition.
Who will talk to me and look after me?
This will depend on your medical condition, symptoms and needs.
Normally, you will see your:
- General Practitioner (GP)
- District or Community Nurse or hospital nurse
- Specialist Nurse
You may be referred to the Specialist Palliative Care Team. They consist of:
- Specialist nurses
- Specialist doctors
- Hospice at Home staff
What is Deciding Right?
Deciding Right is a group of documents specifically designed for you to record and share plans and your wishes for future care.
Have you made any plans?
Has anyone spoken to you about an Advance Statement? This is one of the Deciding Right documents, here you can record thoughts about future care, where you would like to be cared for, any perfume/aftershave you like to wear. This is a small example of the information you can include.
You might hear the term Do Not Attempt Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation or DNACPR being used. What this means is we may continue to treat you with antibiotics, fluids and medication amongst other things, but we would not attempt to restart your heart and lungs should they suddenly stop. CPR can be very traumatic and distressing and is very unlikely to be successful. The team caring for you will offer to discuss this with you, but you may also wish to initiate the conversation.
You might find documents relating to these plans in a Yellow Envelope
Please ask staff for more information. Or you might like to look on the Deciding Right Website.
This can feel quite a scary time, but you are not alone. The staff are here to support, listen and advise you and if they can’t help, they will try to find the person or staff who can. We aim to support and help you to live as well as possible and to die with dignity, whilst supporting your family and carers.
You will have received leaflets from the teams caring for you with their contact details on.
Our team is based above St Bede’s Palliative Care Unit, and our contact details are.
Secretaries 0191 445 5711 or 0191 445 8499