Palliative care is an interdisciplinary medical caregiving approach aimed at optimizing quality of life and mitigating suffering among people with serious, complex, and often terminal illnesses. Within the published literature, many definitions of palliative care exist. The World Health Organization (WHO) describes palliative care as "an approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification and impeccable assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, physical, psychosocial, and spiritual". In the past, palliative care was a disease specific approach, but today the WHO takes a broader patient-centered approach that suggests that the principles of palliative care should be applied as early as possible to any chronic and ultimately fatal illness. This shift was important because if a disease-oriented approach is followed, the needs and preferences of the patient are not fully met and aspects of care, such as pain, quality of life, and social support, as well as spiritual and emotional needs, fail to be addressed. Rather, a patient-centered model prioritizes relief of suffering and tailors care to increase the quality of life for terminally ill patients.
Gentiva Health Services is a provider of home health care, hospice, and related health services in the United States. The company is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. Prior to its October 2014 acquisition by Kindred Healthcare, it was a Fortune 1000 company with over $1.7 billion in annual revenue and a member of the S&P 600 index.
Dame Cicely Mary Strode Saunders was an English nurse, social worker, physician and writer. She is noted for her work in terminal care research and her role in the birth of the hospice movement, emphasising the importance of palliative care in modern medicine, and opposing the legalisation of voluntary euthanasia.
Marie Curie is a registered charitable organisation in the United Kingdom which provides hospice care and support for anyone with an illness they’re likely to die from, and those close to them, and campaigns for better support for dying people. It was established in 1948, the same year as the National Health Service (NHS).
Hospice Palliative Care Ontario (HPCO) is an organization whose members provide end-of-life palliative care to terminal patients in the province of Ontario, Canada. It is the result of an April 2011 merger of the Hospice Association of Ontario (HOA) and the Ontario Palliative Care Association (OPCA). It is one of twelve primary care practitioner units participating in the development of advance care planning in Canada led by the Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association and partly funded by the Canadian Institutes of Health Research.
The Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing, Midwifery & Palliative Care is an academic faculty within King's College London. The faculty is the world's first nursing school to be continuously connected to a fully serving hospital and medical school. Established on 9 July 1860 by Florence Nightingale, the founder of modern nursing, it was a model for many similar training schools through the UK, Commonwealth and other countries for the latter half of the 19th century. It is primarily concerned with the education of people to become nurses and midwives. It also carries out nursing research, continuing professional development and postgraduate programmes. The Faculty forms part of the Waterloo campus on the South Bank of the River Thames and is now one of the largest faculties in the university.
Home health is a nursing specialty in which nurses provide multidimensional home care to patients of all ages. Home health care is a cost efficient way to deliver quality care in the convenience of the client's home. Home health nurses create care plans to achieve goals based on the client's diagnosis. These plans can include preventive, therapeutic, and rehabilitative actions. Home health nurses also supervise certified nursing assistants. The professional nursing organization for home health nurses is the Home Healthcare Nurses Association (HHNA). Home health care is intended for clients that are well enough to be discharged home, but still require skilled nursing personnel to assess, initiate and oversee nursing interventions.
District Nurses work manage care within the community and lead teams of community nurses and support workers. The role requires registered nurses to take a NMC approved specialist practitioner course. Duties generally include visiting house-bound patients and providing advice and care such as palliative care, wound management, catheter and continence care and medication support. Their work involves both follow-up care for recently discharged hospital inpatients and longer-term care for chronically ill patients who may be referred by many other services, as well as working collaboratively with general practitioners in preventing unnecessary or avoidable hospital admissions.
The Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet (CSJ) are a Roman Catholic congregation of women religious which traces its origins to a group founded in Le Puy-en-Velay, France around 1650 by Jean Pierre Medaille, S.J. The design of the congregation was based on the spirituality of the Society of Jesus. The Sisters of St. Joseph of Carondelet became a separate congregation of pontifical right on May 16, 1877.
End-of-life care (EOLC) refers to health care provided in the time leading up to a person's death. End-of-life care can be provided in the hours, days, or months before a person dies and encompasses care and support for a person's mental and emotional needs, physical comfort, spiritual needs, and practical tasks.
Florence Wald was an American nurse, former Dean of Yale School of Nursing, and largely credited as "the mother of the American hospice movement". She led the founding of Connecticut Hospice, the first hospice program in the United States. Late in life, Wald became interested in the provision of hospice care within prisons. In 1998, Wald was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame.
Carondelet St. Joseph's Hospital, also known as St. Joseph's Hospital and Medical Center, is a private, for-profit, 449-bed acute-care hospital on the east side of Tucson, Arizona. St. Joseph's Hospital is a level 1 trauma center and is part of Carondelet Health Network, owned by Tenet Healthcare, and has sister hospitals in Arizona St. Mary's Hospital in Tucson, Marana Hospital in Marana and Holy Cross Hospital in Nogales.
Nurses in Canada practise in a wide variety of settings, with various levels of training and experience. They provide evidence-based care and educate their patients about health and disease.
In the United States, hospice care is a type and philosophy of end-of-life care which focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's symptoms. These symptoms can be physical, emotional, spiritual or social in nature. The concept of hospice as a place to treat the incurably ill has been evolving since the 11th century. Hospice care was introduced to the United States in the 1970s in response to the work of Cicely Saunders in the United Kingdom. This part of health care has expanded as people face a variety of issues with terminal illness. In the United States, it is distinguished by extensive use of volunteers and a greater emphasis on the patient's psychological needs in coming to terms with dying.
Hospice care is a type of health care that focuses on the palliation of a terminally ill patient's pain and symptoms and attending to their emotional and spiritual needs at the end of life. Hospice care prioritizes comfort and quality of life by reducing pain and suffering. Hospice care provides an alternative to therapies focused on life-prolonging measures that may be arduous, likely to cause more symptoms, or are not aligned with a person's goals.
St John of God Murdoch Hospital is a 511-bed private non-profit hospital located in the southern suburbs of Perth in Western Australia, immediately adjacent to the public Fiona Stanley Hospital campus. The distance between the entrances to the emergency departments of these two hospitals is approximately 390 m (427 yd).
Children’s Hospices Across Scotland (CHAS) is a registered charity that provides the country's only hospice services for children and young people with life-shortening conditions, and services across children’s homes and hospitals. The first hospice was built thanks to the late editor-in chief of the Daily Record and Sunday Mail, Endell Laird, who launched a reader appeal which raised £4million. CHAS offers children’s hospice services, free of charge, to every child, young person and their families who needs and wants them.
UP Health System - Portage is a hospital and associated healthcare system based in the Keweenaw Peninsula of Michigan. The healthcare system has several clinics stretching as far north as Lake Linden, Michigan and as far south as offices in L'Anse, Michigan and Ontonagon, Michigan. The system's main building is a 36-bed hospital in Hancock, Michigan. The Portage Health Hospital employs more than 800 people, and is the second largest employer in Houghton County, behind Michigan Technological University. The hospital is one of two in the state of Michigan to be recognized as a Level III trauma center by the American College of Surgeons.
Lucy Finch is a palliative nurse who has worked in several African countries and founded a hospice in Malawi – Ndi Moyo – "the place giving life".
Sonja Jayne McIlfatrick is a nurse and Professor in Nursing and Palliative Care and Dean of Ulster Doctoral College at Ulster University. She was the first non-American President of the International Network of Doctoral Education in Nursing.
