Palliative Care
Palliative Care is a specialist support, care and treatment needed by someone who is living with life-limited condition or illness. There may come a time when your loved one finds themselves in need of home care to support improving the quality of life as they face a life-limiting condition or illness.
What Is Palliative Care
Palliative care is a type of care that focuses on improving individuals quality of life while they`re facing a life-threatening condition. This includes physical care, emotional care and spiritual care.
Live-in care can be one of the form part of your palliative care.- providing companionship and emotional support to you and your family. Being at home allows you to stay in the place you feel most comfortable, surrounded by memories and the people they love.
With one-to-one support from a compassionate carer who is experienced in palliative care, you can have specialist support and symptom relief from serious illness, whenever it is needed.
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Whether you are looking for a full-time live-in carer or few hours per day visits, full range of services can be provided for people living with illnesses that fall into specific criteria:
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Individual coping with cancer or nausea and vomiting, dementia or motor neurone disease.
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Individuals who are suffering from those illnesses tend to have fragile health and pre-existing conditions that typically result in an expected lifespan of less then 12 months.
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Individual with pre-existing medical conditions who may be at increased risk of mortality in the event of a sudden health crisis.
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The individual experiencing a potentially life-threatening acute condition due to a sudden catastrophic event, such us accident or stroke.
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The National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) have guidance on the care of dying adults during their final days. This guidance addresses the management of common symptoms. It emphasises the importance of maintaining dignity and respect for the dying individual and their loved ones and caregivers.
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Palliative care specialists cover all aspects of care including personal care, pain management for neurological and physical symptoms, administering medication, cooking meals, and companionship care.
To find out more about our palliative care service or how we can support you, please contact a member of our care specialist team. We’re here seven days a week to talk through your options.
What is the aim of Palliative Care
The main aim of any sort of care at this stage is to maintain or enhance your loved one’s quality of life, ensuring they remain as well and active as they can, for as long as possible.
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For palliative care, many individuals want to stay in an environment where is most comfortable as a way of managing emotional responses to their symptoms whilst the medical or nursing team will be primarily support with medication and treatment and carers can provide support and companionship to assist with:
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Personal care ,such as assistance with bathing, dressing and toileting
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Continence care, whether it is changing continence pads or managing a stoma or catheter
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Medication support including prompts or administering medication, even the more complex prescriptions
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Support with pain management
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Help moving around the home, whether it is gentle support or hoisted transfers
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Assisted living through housekeeping duties such as vacuuming, dusting, changing beds or doing the laundry
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Preparing meals to your tastes, and washing up afterwards
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Caring for your pet including feeding and walking
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Running errands to collect prescriptions or food shopping
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Companionship and supporting your independent living at home
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Depending on the individual condition or illness, live-in care can be a form of palliative care, providing the companionship support for the person, the family and the rest of the care tea. Live-in care can help people staying at home till the end of their life.
What is the benefit of Palliative care at home?
One of the main benefits of receiving palliative care at home is that it allows you to spend your last months, weeks, and days in the place where you feel most at ease and safe: Your home. This places you in the company of someone you know and trust whilst receiving palliative care.
As well as a family member being satisfied for their loved one receiving care at home where is near them and their close friends.
Because of this, palliative care and hospice care are often synonymous with each other.
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Having care at home instead of a hospital or hospice means less disruption for everybody. Round-the-clock care means that any changes in condition will be noticed and responded to quickly.
Cheshunt Care can provide social support for those who need palliative care. Our matching process ensures that the carer is the right person for the job.
Different conditions require different aspects of care, such as COPD, Dementia and Cancer.
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For those living with COPD, it may be that live-in care is required more so during periods of determination or following hospital stays to aid with recovery, before this type of care is needed.
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For those living with cancer who may experience rapid decline, live in care can provide social and personal care and support towards the end of the period of care.
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Palliative care can be organised for you or your loved one at any stage of the illness and arranging this doesn’t mean that you’re likely to pass any time soon.
As part of the planning process, it mai be important to consider the advanced care planning too. This is a specific type of end-of life planning. For the time you are still able to communicate, you can talk to the medical team about your condition and the preferences for care when this progresses .
End-of-life care
End-of-life care and palliative care is a term used interchangeably, but they do have some differences.
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End-of-life care involves support, care and treatment for someone near to the end of their life and is a vital aspect of palliative care.
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Generally this type of care is provided for the people who are believed that they may have year or less left to live, but in some cases people receive the care for very short period then they actually predicted.
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If your loved one needs end-of-life care, you can be assured that the objective is to make them as comfortable as they can possibly be.
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All care team will come together to ensure each aspect of end-of-life support is provided, Physical, psychological and spiritual support.
It will also often involve talking to you and your loved one about what to expect as their life draws to a close and should ensure that all of your wishes and needs, and those of your loved one, are fully adhered to.
Paying for palliative care
When something like this is happening, people may not want to think about of how they’re going to afford palliative care.
However, it’s important to understand the options available to you. In many cases funding is available through the NHS continuing healthcare. For those nearing the end of their life, there is a fast track service.
For those living with dementia, NHS continuing healthcare is not an option, however funding can be sought through Local Authority
We are with you all the way
When choosing Hearts Kind you are fully in control to make your own decision no matter what challenges you are facing, we'll be able to support every step of the way.
We are only a phone call away:
Accepting the help of a carer can be tough, and everyone processes it differently. We'll listen to you and your family, answer your questions and support you to choose whats best for you or your loved one.
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Your decision your choice:
As you know your strengths, you know what kind of care is best for you. We'll find a carer who is great match for you and you'll get the chance to view their profile, make contact with the carer then make a final decision through your Hearts Kind account.
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