Table 38: Palliative care for heart failure (HF) defined
Palliative care for HF defined
Palliative care is a patient-centered and family-centered approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification and impeccable assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, physical, psychosocial and spiritual. It is applicable early, as well as later, in the course of illness, in conjunction with other therapies that are intended to prolong life, including but not limited to in the setting of HF, oral pharmacotherapy, surgery, implantable device therapy, hemofiltration or dialysis, the use of intravenous inotropic agents, and mechanical circulatory support.

Table 38: Palliative care for heart failure (HF) defined

Palliative care for HF defined

Palliative care is a patient-centered and family-centered approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification and impeccable assessment and treatment of pain and other problems, physical, psychosocial and spiritual. It is applicable early, as well as later, in the course of illness, in conjunction with other therapies that are intended to prolong life, including but not limited to in the setting of HF, oral pharmacotherapy, surgery, implantable device therapy, hemofiltration or dialysis, the use of intravenous inotropic agents, and mechanical circulatory support.

Adapted from the World Health Organization definition for palliative care (http://www.who.int/cancer/palliative/definition/en).

HF, heart failure.