Palliative Care at University of Colorado Hospital
What is Palliative Care?
Palliative care is the medical specialty focused on relief of pain, stress, and other debilitating symptoms of serious illness. The goal is to improve quality of life for you and your family.
Palliative care is appropriate at any point in your illness, and can be provided at the same time as curative treatment.
Our Palliative Care team helps guide you through the emotional roller coaster that comes with serious illness. We take the time to understand your wishes and values, and we match our treatment plans to your values and goals.
For more information, contact the Palliative Care team at (720) 848-6799.
What services are available?
The specific combination of services provided depends on your needs. These include:
- Expert treatment of pain and other symptoms
- Exploring the strength to carry on with daily life
- Maintaining hope
- Emotional and spiritual support
- Better understanding of your condition and choices for medical care
- Enriching communication between you, your family and health care providers
- Guidance with diffcult treatment choices
- Knowing what care services are available after leaving the hospital
How can patients receive services?
Getting palliative care is easy. You can request a referral by talking to your primary doctor. Our Palliative Care team works with your primary doctor, who continues to direct your care.
When is the right time for palliative care?
It's never too early to receive palliative care. It helps at any stage of an illness, and can be delivered at the same time as curative therapies.
Is palliative care the same as hospice care?
No. Hospice care is meant specifically for those approaching the final months of life, while palliative care is appropriate for any stage of a serious illness. Hospice care may take place in your home or other setting. If or when hospice care is desired, the palliative care team can assist with this transition.
Where can I find hospice care resources?
Support in times of illness
We never know when our lives may be turned upside down by a serious or life-threatening illness.
We can’t control this, but we can control the decisions that follow. Having a team of experts to help you navigate through this life-changing time is critical.
“We all have to learn that life is and always will be a mixture of blessing and curse, good and bad, health and sickness…living successfully with chronic illness means learning to balance adaptability and constancy, strength and weakness, love and indifference, humor and sadness, anger and happiness…hope sustains life and this is the hope we all need to continue our lives.”
Aimee Benet – from A Portrait of Chronic Illness, 1996