Palliative Care and Models Administered by Healthcare Professionals - Essay Example

Introduction Palliative care focuses on the relieving of suffering and pain of the patients and offers them a holistic new approach which can help them to reduce their suffering during the disease. The relative strength of this approach is based upon the fact that it can be administrated at any stage of the disease and for any type of disease. This type of care is also a group care where overall input is taken from different stakeholders to administer a unique set of solutions which can help relieve the sufferings of the patient. It therefore not only involves the medical treatment of the patient but emotional, social as well as spiritual support is also provided to the patients and their families in order to reduce the overall suffering of the patients. It is however, critical to note that over the period of time, increase in life expectancy and health standards have actually increased the ratio of patients having chronic diseases. The increased in life expectancy has brought with it some negatives too and as such palliative care has emerged out of this necessity to reduce the suffering and pain of the patients. Due to overall nature and complexity of the issue, there are different models which are being used by the healthcare professionals to administer Palliative care. This essay is a literature review of the existing literature on the topic of Palliative care and what models are and can be administered by healthcare professionals under different conditions. Palliative Care The word Palliative has its roots in the Latin word “Pallium” meaning cloak or covers and is often used literally as to relieve without actually curing. In literal term, it also refers to the treatment provided to the patients which normally do not respond to the curative treatment. It is considered as a complex system wherein palliative care service providers have to actually upgrade their skills and abilities to match them with the unique requirements of the each patient. The overall complexity of the care involved therefore requires that Palliative care should be delivered by healthcare professionals who are skilled and trained to provide such services.( Davison, 2004) World Health Organization has put more emphasis on this aspect of providing healthcare and has even changed the definition of the term. It suggests that Palliative care is an approach that actually improves the life of the patient as well as the patient family. This treatment however, is given to the patients facing life threatening diseases and is administrated through prevention and relief from suffering.( Finlay , Higginson , Goodwin et al 2002) The above definition of Palliative care however, includes a variety of different techniques and means which are used by the healthcare professions to provide this care. It includes following: 1. Providing relief from pain and other symptoms 2. Help patients and families to recognize that death is a normal process and occurs to everyone. 3. Provides integrated support for both the psychological as well as spiritual aspects of providing care to patients. 4. Provide support system which can help patients to actually live actively till they die. 5. Using team based approach to involve multi-disciplinary team members to help patients and families to cope with the increasing level of stress faced due to illness or potential death. 6. Provide such care and solutions which can actually improve the life of the patient and have a positive influence on the overall patient outcome. The overall movement for Palliative care started as a separate and distinctive medical specialty started to emerge during 1987. It however emerged out of the hospice movement and started to develop as a different and separate medical alternative available to healthcare professionals to relieve the suffering of the patient. It is also the only approach which specifically does not focus on the cancer patients as its scope extends to almost every disease at any stage. Over the period of time, this has emerged as an integral part of all clinical practices and is not dependent upon the overall stage of the disease. It is also important to note that in order to actually properly administer this, highly skilled and trained staff is necessary. Without the active participation of skilled and trained staff, it may be relatively difficult for healthcare services providers to actually deliver the right kind of healthcare solutions for their patients. Various research studies have specifically outlined that the care for the dying patients specifically depends upon the organizational skills and motivation. Since the caring of dying is relatively different from care of other individuals, it therefore requires greater resources to actually participate into Palliative care facilities offered to the patients. It is critical to note that palliative care can be offered at two different locations i.e. the hospitals or homes. However, there are some relative differences between the two despite the fact that most of deaths occur in hospitals. This is regardless of the fact that given the choice, patients like to die at home. Palliative care in Australia Australia has witnessed an improvement in its life expectancy and as a result of this; the healthcare needs have improved too. It has been suggested that up to half of the annual deaths in Australia can be predicted with accepted level of certainty. This therefore also indicates that there are greater needs for palliative care in the country. Considering these new trends, a national palliative care strategy was formulated in 1998 and a comprehensive document was prepared to actually guide states and other territories to actually formulate adequate response in Palliative care. The overall goal of this strategy was to actually raise awareness about the Palliative care as well as measure its effectiveness and appropriateness. Besides, it also attempted to leadership and governance besides increasing the capacity and capability of the hospitals to improve upon on the delivery of the Palliative care services. In Australia, Palliative care is offered both in the community settings as well as in the hospitals. Various studies have actually identified the available resources to the hospitals and professionals involved in providing Palliative care services. These resources however may not be adequate given the fact that more and more people may require the assistance in terms of relieving their symptoms of stress and pain. (Kardamanidis , Da Cunha , Taylor , Jorm . 2007) Palliative care services can be divided into two groups i.e. Primary services and specialist services. Primary palliative services are given to all the patients regardless of the stage of their disease and are mostly without any significant hope of being cured. The persons involved in delivering such type of services are mostly general practioners, community nurses etc. and are delivered mostly in the hospital settings.( Gardiner , Rumbold , Salau . 2009) The specialist palliative care is given by the professionals with recognized skills and trainings in the palliative care and is mostly appropriate for patients having life limiting diseases but has also progressed beyond curative treatment. In Australia there are two models i.e. metropolitan and rural service models which are being followed while providing Palliative care to the patients. Both these models require different physical as well as financial resources in order to deliver the required palliative care services in respective care settings. Davison & Sloan (2003) argued that there are certain distinct individual behaviors which can be identified in the Palliative care. This research study has focused on the Australian cross functional teams involved in the palliative care and confirmed that such unique behaviors and attitude can be easily identified in the people involved in the providing of Palliative care services. These behaviors however are distinctive on two different counts i.e. when members of the cross functional teams interact with the patients and when they actually deal with each other while being away from the patients. (Davison, 2005) In order to properly integrate the team approach in providing both the primary as well as specialist palliative care services, it is critically important that organization must also be involved. In order to achieve the team dynamics required to achieve the intended objectives, it is important that some organizational levers must be present. The presence of such organizational levers ensures that the cross functional teams can be integrated into the whole system to provide a comprehensive set of services for the patients requiring Palliative care.( Hyland, Davison, & Sloan, 2003) Research studies have also focused upon the innovation and creativity with the additional resources required to effectively deliver such services. There is a greater need to work on the establishment of relationships between the members involved in the delivering of such services across various settings. (Davison, & Hyland, 2002) Conclusion The Palliative care has started to achieve significance during the later part of the 20th century however it is now considered as essential part of the providing integrated services to the patients which go beyond the curative treatment. Palliative care is given to the patients and their families to actually relieve them from pain and also make a smooth transition where a patient can easily die. In Australia, due to higher life expectancy the need for palliative care has increased however, the overall management of Palliative care require an integrated approach and also requires management of innovation. Bibliography Davison, G & Sloan, T 2003 "Palliative care teams and individual behaviours", Team Performance Management, 9(3/4), p.69 – 77 Davison, G 2004 "Palliative care teams and management levers", Team Performance Management, 10(1/2), p.12 – 19 Davison, G 2005 "Configured for innovation: the case of palliative care", European Journal of Innovation Management, 8 (2), p.205 - 226 Davison,G & Hyland, P 2002 "Palliative care teams and organisational capability", Team Performance Management, 8(3/4), p.60 – 67 Finlay I, Higginson D, Goodwin A et al 2002 Palliative care in hospital, hospice, at Home: results from a systematic review. European Society for Medical Oncology. Gardiner F, Rumbold B, Salau S. 2009. Final Report: Strengthening Palliative Care through Health Promotion. Hyland, P, Davison, G & Sloan, T, 2003 "Linking team competences to organisational capacity", Team Performance Management, 9(5/6), p.97 – 106 Kardamanidis K, Da Cunha C, Taylor L, Jorm L. 2007 Hospital costs of older people in New South Wales in the last year of life. MJA ; 187 (7): P383-386. Read More