![]() ![]() Consequently, many patients and their families remain reluctant to even discuss the possibility of hospice care or palliative care. For many in Western society, death remains a taboo subject. Talking about hospice and palliative careĪlthough death is a natural part of life, the thought of dying understandably still frightens many of us. In some cases, palliative treatments may be used to alleviate the side effects of curative treatment, such as relieving the nausea associated with chemotherapy, which may help you tolerate more aggressive or longer-term treatment. The term “palliative care” refers to any care that alleviates symptoms, and can be helpful at any stage of an illness, even when there is still hope of a cure by other means. It is an approach that focuses on the relief of pain, symptoms, and emotional stress brought on by serious illness. ![]() This enables you to spend your final days in a familiar, comfortable environment, surrounded by your loved ones and supported by hospice staff. ![]() While some hospitals, nursing homes, and other health care facilities provide hospice care onsite, in most cases it's provided in the patient’s own home. Hospice is traditionally an option for people whose life expectancy is six months or less, and involves palliative care (pain and symptom relief) rather than ongoing curative measures, enabling you to live your last days to the fullest, with purpose, dignity, grace, and support. Seeking hospice and palliative care isn’t about giving up hope or hastening death, but rather a way to get the most appropriate and best quality care in the last phase of your life. Palliative medicine helps you manage pain while hospice provides special care to improve the quality of life for both you as the patient and your family. To view a copy of our written submission, please click here.For many seriously ill patients, hospice and palliative care offers a more dignified and comfortable alternative to spending your final months in the impersonal environment of a hospital, far from family, friends, pets, and all that you know and love. Hospice New Zealand recently presented to members of the Health Select Committee in Wellington. We must focus on helping people to live well until they die. In our experience, good palliative care allows people to die as comfortably as possible. Services are also in place to support family and whanau both before and after the death of their loved one. The palliative care team will work with a person to manage their symptoms and help them feel as comfortable as possible, with their dignity maintained. Hospice believes that death is a natural part of life and that with the right palliative care, a person with a life-limiting condition can have a good quality of life. Hospice services and palliative care, as defined by the World Health Organisation, “intends neither to hasten or postpone death”, and this is the cornerstone of hospice care in New Zealand.Įuthanasia or physician-assisted death goes against this because it hastens death. In June 2015, New Zealand’s Health Select Committee received a petition requesting that the House of Representatives “investigate fully public attitudes towards the introduction of legislation which would permit medically-assisted dying in the event of a terminal illness or an irreversible condition which makes life unbearable.” The petition asked for a change to existing law, and the committee began an investigation into ending one’s life in New Zealand.Īs an organisation, the hospice sector does not support any change to the legislation around euthanasia or physician assisted death. The Fundamentals of Palliative Care Programme – Ngā Tūāpapa, o te Pairuri Tāngata.Euthanasia in Canada – a cautionary tale. ![]()
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