FIU Palliative Care Discussion Response

Please respond to discussion below using APA 7th edition. Please use 3 peer reviewed journal references dates less than 4 years and 1 interactive question.

Introducing patients and their families to palliative care can be complex for healthcare providers, especially when it involves someone you know and respect. It can also be difficult for the patient and family members when the decisions have been made to not continue with treatment and face the course of the disease. The most devastating part of dealing with the inevitable fact is that untreated cancer ends with death and does not come without pain and suffering for the patient and the loved ones feeling not physical pain but mental pain. Advanced practice nurses (APRNs) should incorporate some training in palliative care (Ferrell et al., 2020).

Some important questions should be addressed when helping patients and family members decide on palliative care. What is the understanding of where things stand with your illness? Can you tell me about your wishes at this stage in your disease? How is your family coping with your condition? How important is it to you to make sure your family is involved in the next care steps for you? Tell me about the pain you are feeling at this point? Examining the answers to these questions can steer the conversation to the patient’s needs while involving the family members at the patient’s request. It is of utmost importance to fulfill the patients’ needs, but understanding the level of family involvement is crucial to transitioning to palliative care. Research suggests that incorporating palliative care as soon as possible can improve the patient and family’s stress (Philip et al., 2021).

It is unfortunate, but the pain is a component of dealing with cancer toward the end of life. It is crucial to develop an appropriate pain management plan tailoring it to the needs of the individual. Management of pain should not just involve pharmacology management but should also incorporate spiritual, culture, and alternative therapies. Pain management for terminally ill patients should evaluate the pain by determining the area, how often, intensity, and the patient’s wishes on appropriate pain management. This plan should also include whether the patient and family would like the care to occur in the home or a facility is a vital aspect to explore. Once the evaluation part of the plan has been established, the next step is to determine multi-modal pain management medications that will effectively reduce pain sensations and decide the appropriate alternative therapies to enhance the reduction in painful feelings (Sholjakova et al., 2018). Also, when faced with developing a proper treatment plan for pain management, it is crucial to include the patient’s spiritual aspect, which involves a person meaning, purpose, and how they connect with others to improve the quality of life during this transition (Røen et al., 2021). It would be appropriate to address with the patient and family members that the end of life is sadly inevitable. As the disease progresses, it is reasonable to provide education that the most important aspect is ensuring the patient is getting adequate pain relief while placing less worry on addiction to certain medications. When the disease progression results in increased anxiety, confusion, and dyspnea, these conditions should be shifted to more frequent and potent medications to combat these symptoms and provide adequate relief. At this stage in the disease, oxygen, benzodiazepines, and morphine should be incorporated to manage the patients’ symptoms effectively. During the evaluation stage, the patient and families should be educated on hospice, and the availability of resources as the disease progresses to shift the plan from pain management to ensure a comfortable transition to death.

References

Ferrell, B., Malloy, P., Virani, R., Economou, D., & Mazanec, P. (2020). Preparing oncology advanced practice rns as generalists in palliative care. Oncology Nursing Forum, 47(2), 222–227. https://doi.org/10.1188/20.onf.222-227

Philip, J., Le Gautier, R., Collins, A., Nowak, A. K., Le, B., Crawford, G. B., Rankin, N., Krishnasamy, M., Mitchell, G., McLachlan, S.-A., IJzerman, M., Hudson, R., Rischin, D., Sousa, T., & Sundararajan, V. (2021). Care plus study: A multi-site implementation of early palliative care in routine practice to improve health outcomes and reduce hospital admissions for people with advanced cancer: A study protocol. BMC Health Services Research, 21(1). https://doi.org/10.1186/s12913-021-06476-3

Røen, I., Brenne, A.-T., Brunelli, C., Stifoss-Hanssen, H., Grande, G., Solheim, T., Kaasa, S., & Knudsen, A. (2021). Spiritual quality of life in family carers of patients with advanced cancer—a cross-sectional study. Supportive Care in Cancer, 29(9), 5329–5339. https://doi.org/10.1007/s00520-021-06080-5

Sholjakova, M., Durnev, V., Kartalov, A., & Kuzmanovska, B. (2018). Pain relief as an integral part of the palliative care. Open Access Macedonian Journal of Medical Sciences, 6(4), 739–741. https://doi.org/10.3889/oamjms.2018.163