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To 'palliate' means to ease or relieve. Palliative Care provides extra, special care to relieve discomforts and pains, reduce difficulties, and help with decisions and planning.

Palliative care is available to patients of HHC hospitals whose doctors believe they may benefit from it. Most patients do not pay extra for Palliative Care. On the advice of medical staff, patients or family members can request that the physician help to make the decision that palliative care is right.

Palliative Care is different from hospice. Palliative care can provide help at the start of a serious illness and continue all the way through -- even while treatments like surgery, chemotherapy, radiation, and other medications are given. Hospice is a kind of palliative care usually arranged for people who accept that they may be at the end of life and who don't want any difficult treatments or tests.

Palliative Care is a philosophy of health care that makes a real difference in the lives of patients and families. It provides extra care based on four principles:

• Comfort - Palliative Care specialists understand how to treat pain and discomfort. By making the right arrangements and ordering the right medications they can ease pain and the symptoms of disease, improve quality of life for those who are suffering, and bring peace of mind.
• Support - Palliative Care teams often include doctors, nurses, social workers, psychologists, and religious and spiritual professionals. If the patient wants, the team can help the patient's whole family. When serious or advanced illness arises, it can be hard on everyone.
• Dignity - Palliative Care teams listen to patients, and they help patients and families understand what is going on now and to plan for the future-even after the hospital. Palliative care is about dignity and caring.
• Hope - When illness comes, it may not be easy to find strength or hope. Families and friends may wish to provide hope but not know how. The Palliative Care team can help patients and families see new possibilities and find insights that bring peace and a path to healing troubled relationships.

For more information, ask your doctor, nurse, or contact a team member in one of these HHC Palliative Care Offices: