Skip to Content

What conditions qualify for palliative care?

Palliative care is specialized medical care for people with serious illnesses. It focuses on providing relief from symptoms and stress of the illness. The goal is to improve quality of life for both the patient and the family.

What is Palliative Care?

Palliative care is specialized medical care for people with serious illnesses. It focuses on providing relief from the symptoms, pain, and stress of a serious illness—whatever the diagnosis. The goal is to improve quality of life for both the patient and the family.

Palliative care is provided by a specially trained team of doctors, nurses, and other specialists who work together with a patient’s other doctors to provide an extra layer of support. It is appropriate at any age and at any stage in a serious illness, and it can be provided along with curative treatment.

When is Palliative Care Appropriate?

Palliative care may be appropriate at any stage of illness when a person experiences symptoms or stress from their medical condition. People with serious illnesses like cancer, cardiac disease, respiratory disease, kidney failure, Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) and many more can benefit from palliative care.

Palliative care can be provided at the same time as treatment meant to cure you. You don’t have to stop treatment aimed at curing your illness to receive palliative care. For example, people undergoing surgery, chemotherapy, or other therapy can also receive palliative care to manage symptoms.

In fact, receiving palliative care early in treatment often helps people better tolerate medical treatments and improve their quality of life.

What are the Goals of Palliative Care?

Palliative care aims to:

  • Provide relief from symptoms including pain, shortness of breath, fatigue, constipation, nausea, loss of appetite, difficulty sleeping, and others
  • Reduce stress from living with a serious illness
  • Improve your ability to tolerate medical treatments
  • Improve your quality of life and help you maintain independence and functionality
  • Provide an extra layer of support for you and your family

The palliative care team often includes palliative care physicians, nurses, social workers, and chaplains. They work together with your other doctors to:

  • Assess your symptoms thoroughly
  • Manage your medications and recommend treatments to relieve symptoms
  • Provide emotional and social support to you and your family
  • Help you understand your illness and make informed medical decisions
  • Discuss your goals, values, and preferences for care
  • Coordinate care among all your healthcare providers
  • Provide an extra layer of support to complement your medical treatments

What Symptoms are Treated with Palliative Care?

Palliative care provides treatment for symptoms that may occur with a serious illness, including:

  • Pain – Using medications and other approaches to control pain
  • Shortness of breath – Treating causes like lung disease, anemia, or heart failure
  • Fatigue – Assessing for treatable causes like anemia, depression, pain, poor sleep
  • Nausea – Anti-nausea medications and nutrition advice
  • Loss of appetite – Measures to make eating easier and more appealing
  • Difficulty sleeping – Sleep hygiene tips, medication adjustments
  • Constipation – Bowel regimens, diet changes, laxatives
  • Diarrhea – Medications, diet recommendations
  • Depression – Antidepressants, counseling, support groups
  • Anxiety – Therapies to reduce stress
  • Delirium – Identifying and treating underlying causes
  • Grief/coping – Counseling and peer support

The palliative care team helps get symptoms under control so you can get back to enjoying time with family and friends, eating the foods you like, and doing activities you enjoy.

How Does Palliative Care Help Families and Caregivers?

Palliative care includes support for your loved ones as well. Caring for someone with a serious illness can be physically and emotionally draining. Palliative care provides family members with:

  • Help navigating treatment options and making medical decisions
  • Coaching on how to best support you
  • Respite care services to relieve caregiver burnout
  • Grief counseling and bereavement support
  • Assistance with transitioning from active treatment to hospice care

This extra support helps reduce stress and anxiety for family members and enables them to provide better care.

When Should Palliative Care Begin?

The greatest benefit comes from starting palliative care early in the course of illness, not waiting until end of life. Palliative care can begin at diagnosis of a serious illness and be provided at the same time as treatment focused on a cure.

Here are some situations in which early palliative care may help:

  • After being diagnosed with a serious illness like cancer, heart failure, COPD, kidney disease
  • After a hospitalization for a health crisis
  • When living with multiple chronic conditions that impact quality of life
  • When treatment stops working for an illness like cancer or kidney disease
  • When experiencing difficult side effects from medical treatments
  • When faced with decisions about medical treatments and options
  • When symptoms like pain or nausea are not relieved by current approaches

Talk to your doctor if you are living with a serious illness and interested in adding palliative care support.

Where is Palliative Care Provided?

Palliative care is provided wherever you receive medical care including:

  • Hospitals – Consultation from a palliative care team
  • Outpatient palliative care clinics
  • Long term care facilities – On-site palliative care programs
  • Hospice care – For end-of-life symptom management
  • At home -Home-based palliative care

The palliative care team works in collaboration with your other medical providers like your primary care doctor and specialists. They help coordinate your care across settings.

Who Provides Palliative Care?

Palliative care uses a team approach to care. The core palliative care team typically includes:

  • Physicians – Palliative care specialists
  • Nurses – Palliative care nurse practitioners or nurses with training in palliative care
  • Social workers – Help with coping and emotional issues
  • Chaplains – Can provide spiritual support

Additional team members may include: pharmacists, nutritionists, physical therapists, occupational therapists, speech therapists, and psychologists.

The palliative care team works in coordination with your primary treating physicians and specialists to provide an extra layer of support.

Common Conditions for Palliative Care

Many serious illnesses can benefit from palliative care. Some of the most common conditions include:

Cancer Heart Disease Lung Disease
  • Lung cancer
  • Pancreatic cancer
  • Leukemia
  • Lymphoma
  • Ovarian cancer
  • Brain cancer
  • Metastatic cancer
  • Congestive heart failure
  • End-stage coronary artery disease
  • Severe valvular heart disease
  • COPD
  • Pulmonary fibrosis
  • Cystic fibrosis
Kidney Disease Neurologic Diseases Dementia
  • End-stage renal disease
  • Chronic kidney failure
  • Parkinson’s disease
  • ALS
  • Multiple sclerosis
  • Stroke
  • Alzheimer’s disease
  • Lewy body dementia
  • Frontotemporal dementia

Many other conditions like liver disease, HIV/AIDS, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), sickle cell disease, and advanced frailty can also benefit from palliative care.

Talk to Your Doctor about Palliative Care

If you or a loved one is living with a serious illness, bring up palliative care with your doctor. Getting palliative care support early helps improve symptoms, stress levels, and ability to tolerate treatments. It provides an extra layer of support at any stage of illness.

Ask your physician these questions:

  • Could palliative care help me have a better quality of life?
  • What symptoms or stress might it help with?
  • How can palliative care work with my other treatments?
  • When do you recommend starting palliative care?
  • Will my insurance cover it? What are the costs?

Palliative care complements other medical treatments and helps you live as fully as possible. Don’t hesitate to explore this option if faced with a serious illness.

Conclusion

Palliative care provides an extra layer of support for anyone facing a serious illness like cancer, heart failure, lung disease, kidney failure, neurologic disease, and many others. It focuses on managing symptoms, reducing stress, and improving quality of life. Palliative care can be provided at any age and any stage of illness alongside curative treatments.

Talk to your doctor if you or a loved one has a serious medical condition and could benefit from the symptom relief, extra support, and improved quality of life that palliative care provides. Getting palliative care early on helps people better tolerate treatments and live life to the fullest.