Author: Henry Fersko-Weiss
Publisher: Conari Press
ISBN: 1633410366
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 244
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Book Description
Caring for the Dying describes a whole new way to approach death and dying. It explores how the dying and their families can bring deep meaning and great comfort to the care given at the end of a life. Created by Henry Fersko-Weiss, the end-of-life doula model is adapted from the work of birth doulas and helps the dying to find meaning in their life, express that meaning in powerful and beautiful legacies, and plan for the final days. The approach calls for around-the-clock vigil care, so the dying person and their family have the emotional and spiritual support they need along with guidance on signs and symptoms of dying. It also covers the work of reprocessing a death with the family afterward and the early work of grieving. Emphasis is placed on the space around the dying person and encourages the use of touch, guided imagery, and ritual during the dying process. Throughout the book Fersko-Weiss tells amazing and encouraging stories of the people he has cared for, as well as stories that come from doulas he has trained and worked with over the years. What is unique about this book is the well-conceived and thorough approach it describes to working skillfully with the dying. The guidance provided can help a dying person, their family, and caregivers to transform the dying experience from one of fear and despair into one that is uplifting and even life affirming. You will see death in a new light and gain a different perspective on how to help the dying. It may even change the way you live your life right now.
Author: Committee on Care at the End of Life
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309518253
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 457
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Book Description
When the end of life makes its inevitable appearance, people should be able to expect reliable, humane, and effective caregiving. Yet too many dying people suffer unnecessarily. While an "overtreated" dying is feared, untreated pain or emotional abandonment are equally frightening. Approaching Death reflects a wide-ranging effort to understand what we know about care at the end of life, what we have yet to learn, and what we know but do not adequately apply. It seeks to build understanding of what constitutes good care for the dying and offers recommendations to decisionmakers that address specific barriers to achieving good care. This volume offers a profile of when, where, and how Americans die. It examines the dimensions of caring at the end of life: Determining diagnosis and prognosis and communicating these to patient and family. Establishing clinical and personal goals. Matching physical, psychological, spiritual, and practical care strategies to the patient's values and circumstances. Approaching Death considers the dying experience in hospitals, nursing homes, and other settings and the role of interdisciplinary teams and managed care. It offers perspectives on quality measurement and improvement, the role of practice guidelines, cost concerns, and legal issues such as assisted suicide. The book proposes how health professionals can become better prepared to care well for those who are dying and to understand that these are not patients for whom "nothing can be done."
Author: Institute of Medicine
Publisher: National Academies Press
ISBN: 0309303133
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 638
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Book Description
For patients and their loved ones, no care decisions are more profound than those made near the end of life. Unfortunately, the experience of dying in the United States is often characterized by fragmented care, inadequate treatment of distressing symptoms, frequent transitions among care settings, and enormous care responsibilities for families. According to this report, the current health care system of rendering more intensive services than are necessary and desired by patients, and the lack of coordination among programs increases risks to patients and creates avoidable burdens on them and their families. Dying in America is a study of the current state of health care for persons of all ages who are nearing the end of life. Death is not a strictly medical event. Ideally, health care for those nearing the end of life harmonizes with social, psychological, and spiritual support. All people with advanced illnesses who may be approaching the end of life are entitled to access to high-quality, compassionate, evidence-based care, consistent with their wishes. Dying in America evaluates strategies to integrate care into a person- and family-centered, team-based framework, and makes recommendations to create a system that coordinates care and supports and respects the choices of patients and their families. The findings and recommendations of this report will address the needs of patients and their families and assist policy makers, clinicians and their educational and credentialing bodies, leaders of health care delivery and financing organizations, researchers, public and private funders, religious and community leaders, advocates of better care, journalists, and the public to provide the best care possible for people nearing the end of life.
Author: Elisha Waldman
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190066547
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 112
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Book Description
As humanitarian aid organizations have evolved, there is a growing recognition that incorporating palliative care into aid efforts is an essential part of providing the best care possible. A Field Manual for Palliative Care in Humanitarian Crises represents the first-ever effort at educating and providing guidance for clinicians not formally trained in palliative care in how to incorporate its principles into their work in crisis situations. Written by a team of international experts, this pocket-sized manual identifies the needs of people affected by natural hazards, political or ethnic conflict, epidemics of life-threatening infections, and other humanitarian crises. Later chapters explore topics including pain management, skin conditions, non-communicable diseases, palliative care emergencies, the law and ethics of end of life care, and more. Concise and highly accessible, this manual is an ideal educational tool pre-deployment or during fieldwork for clinicians involved in planning and providing humanitarian aid, local care providers, and medical trainees.
Author: Bonnie Freeman
Publisher: Springer Publishing Company
ISBN: 0826122477
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 297
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Book Description
A milestone resource for palliative care nurses that facilitates evidence-based compassionate and humanistic care of the dying A valuable contribution to the evolving field of palliative nursing care. It is authored by a model for this field, Bonnie Freeman, and brings to the bedside what her practice embodies--evidence-based clinically expert care...The CARES tool is a long-needed resource and we are all grateful to the author for moving her passion to paper. It will touch the lives and deaths of patients, families, and the nurses who care for them. --Betty Ferrell, PhD, RN, MA, FAAN, FCPN, CHPN Professor and Director, Division of Nursing Research and Education City of Hope National Medical Center From the Foreword This groundbreaking reference for palliative care nurses is the first to provide realistic and achievable evidence-based methods for incorporating compassionate and humanistic care of the dying into current standards of practice. It builds on the author's research-based CARES tool; a reference that synthesizes five key elements demonstrated to enable a peaceful death, as free from suffering as possible: comfort, airway management, management of restlessness and delirium, emotional and spiritual support, and selfcare for nurses. The book describes, step by step, how nurses can easily implement the basic tenets of the CARES tool into their end-of-life practice. It provides a clearly defined plan that can be individualized for each patient and tailored to specific family needs, and facilitates caring for the dying in the most respectful and humane way possible. The book identifies the most common symptom management needs in dying patients and describes, in detail, the five components of the CARES paradigm and how to implement them to enable a peaceful death and minimize suffering. It includes palliative care prompts founded on 29 evidence-based recommendations and the National Consensus Project for Palliative Care Clinical Practice Guidelines. The resource also addresses the importance of the nurse to act as a patient advocate, how to achieve compassionate communication with the patient and family, and barriers and challenges to compassionate care. Case studies emphasize the importance of compassionate nursing care of the dying and how it can be effectively achieved. Key Features: Provides nurses with a clear understanding of the most common needs of the dying and supplies practical applications to facilitate and improve care Clarifies the current and often complex literature on care of the dying Includes case studies illustrating the most common needs of dying patients and how these are addressed effectively by the CARES tool Based on extensive evidence as well as on the National Consensus Project for Palliative Care Clinical Practice Guidelines Bonnie Freeman, DNP, ANP, RN, ACHPN, is an adult nurse practitioner in the Department of Supportive Care Medicine at the City of Hope National Medical Center in Duarte, California. She is involved with treating the symptom management needs of many chronically and terminally ill individuals diagnosed with various forms of cancer. Dr. Freeman trained at such excellent facilities as the in-patient units at San Diego Hospice and the Institute of Palliative Medicine in San Diego, California, and the home care hospice program in Owensboro, Kentucky. While in Kentucky, she completed her advanced practice clinical training for adult nurse practitioners with a specialty focus on palliative care through Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. This program exposed Dr. Freeman to current concepts in caring for the dying, and enhanced her already significant clinical experience caring for dying individuals acquired from over 30 years working in critical care. Dr. Freeman obtained her MSN from Indiana Wesleyan University, and her DNP from Azusa Pacific University in Azusa, California. Contributors Tracey Das Gupta, MN, RN, CON, is director of Interprofessional Practice at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. She is also the colead of the Quality Dying Initiative with Dr. Jeff Myers. Tracey has been passionate about health care, quality of life, and leadership since becoming a nurse in 1991. Her decision to become a nurse was influenced by her father who lived with muscular dystrophy. Ms. Das Gupta has fulfilled various frontline nursing roles along the continuum of care and has had the opportunity to continue to grow in leadership roles such as educator, professional practice leader, and director of nursing practice. In her current role, she also provides leadership for the development and implementation of Sunnybrook's interprofessional care (IPC) strategy. Margaret Fitch, PhD, MScN, is a nurse researcher and holds an appointment at the Bloomberg Faculty of Nursing and School of Graduate Studies at the University of Toronto. She also serves as expert lead for cancer survivorship and patient experience for the Person-Centered Perspective Portfolio of the Canadian Partnership Against Cancer. She is also editor-in-chief for the Canadian Oncology Nursing Journal. Dr. Fitch has an extensive publication record based on her many years of research regarding patient perspectives, coping and adaptation with illness, and screening for psychosocial distress. She has particular expertise in measurement and evaluation, qualitative methods, and knowledge integration. During her career, she has held clinical and administrative positions and has maintained an ongoing role in education of both undergraduate and graduate students and health professionals in practice.
Author: David A. Fleming
Publisher: University of Missouri Press
ISBN: 0826272215
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 172
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Book Description
Although the need for improved care for dying patients is widely recognized and frequently discussed, few books address the needs of the physicians, nurses, social workers, therapists, hospice team members, and pastoral counselors involved in care. Care of the Dying Patient contains material not found in other sources, offering advice and solutions to anyone—professional caregiver or family member—confronted with incurable illness and death. Its authors have lectured and published extensively on care of the dying patient and here review a wide range of topics to show that relief of physical suffering is not the only concern in providing care. This collection encompasses diverse aspects of end-of-life care across multiple disciplines, offering a broad perspective on such central issues as control of pain and other symptoms, spirituality, the needs of caregivers, and special concerns regarding the elderly. In its pages, readers will find out how to: effectively utilize palliative-care services and activate timely referral to hospice, arrange for care that takes into account patients’ cultural beliefs, and respond to spiritual and psychological distress, including the loss of hope that often overshadows physical suffering. The authors especially emphasize palliative care and hospice, since some physicians fear that such referrals may be viewed by patients and families as abandonment. They also address ethical and legal risks in pain management and warn that fear of overprescribing pain medication may inadvertently lead to ineffective pain relief and even place the treating team at risk of liability for undertreatment of pain. While physicians have the ability to treat disease, they also help to determine the time and place of death, and they must recognize that end-of-life choices are made more complex than ever before by advances in medicine and at the same time increasingly important. Care of the Dying Patient addresses some of the challenges frequently confronted in terminal care and points the way toward a more compassionate way of death.
Author: Dame Cicely M. Saunders
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Family & Relationships
Languages : en
Pages : 84
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Book Description
The new edition of this successful book has been up-dated to incorporate recent advances in both approach to, and treatment of, the terminally ill. Based on many years of monitoring clinical practice and research at St Christopher's Hospice, Dame Cicely Saunders presents practical, balanced advice on the general ethical and medical principles of caring for dying patients. This will continue to be an invaluable handbook for all hospice physicians and nurses as a compassionate source of factual information.
Author: SUSAN. LOWEY
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages :
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Book Description
Author: Ira Byock
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 110150028X
Category : Medical
Languages : en
Pages : 321
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Book Description
From Ira Byock, prominent palliative care physician and expert in end of life decisions, a lesson in Dying Well. Nobody should have to die in pain. Nobody should have to die alone. This is Ira Byock's dream, and he is dedicating his life to making it come true. Dying Well brings us to the homes and bedsides of families with whom Dr. Byock has worked, telling stories of love and reconciliation in the face of tragedy, pain, medical drama, and conflict. Through the true stories of patients, he shows us that a lot of important emotional work can be accomplished in the final months, weeks, and even days of life. It is a companion for families, showing them how to deal with doctors, how to talk to loved ones—and how to make the end of life as meaningful and enriching as the beginning. Ira Byock is also the author of The Best Care Possible: A Physician's Quest to Transform Care Through the End of Life.
Author: Julia Lawton
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134588674
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 240
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Book Description
Taking as its focus a highly emotive area of study, The Dying Process draws on the experiences of daycare and hospice patients to provide a forceful new analysis of the period of decline prior to death. Placing the bodily realities of dying very firmly centre stage and questioning the ideology central to the modern hospice movement of enabling patients to 'live until they die', Julia Lawton shows how our concept of a 'good death' is open to interpretation. Her study examines the non-negotiable effects of a patient's bodily deterioration on their sense of self and, in so doing, offers a powerful new perspective in embodiment and emotion in death and dying. A detailed and subtle ethnographic study, The Dying Process engages with a range of deeply complex and ethically contentious issues surrounding the care of dying patients in hospices and elsewhere.
