Palliative Care at University of Colorado Hospital
What is Palliative Care?
Palliative Care is a specialized form of health care that relieves, but does not cure, symptoms of disease or illness. A team of specially trained professionals at the University of Colorado Hospital’s Palliative Care Consult Services provide help for those who are dealing with serious, long-term or advanced illness.
Why Use Palliative Care Consult Services?
Palliative Care can improve the quality of life of patients who have a serious or life-threatening disease or injury.
Our goal is to prevent or treat:
- Symptoms of the disease
- Side effects caused by treatment
- Psychological, social and spiritual problems related to the disease or its treatment
Anyone involved with a patient’s care can request that the Palliative Care Consult Services team take an active part in a patient’s treatment after speaking to the patient’s primary doctor, including:
- Patients
- Family members
- Doctors
- Nurses
- Hospital employees
Palliative Care Benefits
- Help for patients and their families through all phases of illness
- Relief of patient and family suffering
- Direct consultation with a patient’s primary care doctor(s) and nurses
- Assistance for the physical, psychological, social, emotional and spiritual needs of patients and families
- Patient dignity
- Help for patients and families make important health care and personal goals
- Guidance about advanced directives, living wills, and disease management
- Assistance with the transition to hospice care if the patient and/or family choose to stop treatments that would otherwise prolong life. Care becomes entirely comfort based.
Palliative Care Services Available at University of Colorado Hospital
We provide a number of services that can be personalized for you or your family’s specific needs. Team members from Palliative Care Consult Services at University of Colorado Hospital can help you decide the best care for your situation.
The Palliative Care Consult Services Team can help you:
- Determine the best treatments to treat pain and other symptoms
- Plan for care after hospitalization
- Address physical, psychological, social, emotional, and spiritual needs
- Clarify patient/family wishes and treatment goals
- Communicate with the patient, family members, and health care providers
- Determine end-of-life choices
- With grief support
Who Can Receive Palliative Care Services?
Any patient or family facing a serious, long-term, or advanced illness or injury - no matter the diagnosis - can receive service.
How Can I Or My Loved One Receive Palliative Care Services?
Anyone involved with a patient’s care, including doctors, nurses, University of Colorado Hospital employees, patients and their families can request that the Palliative Care Consult Services team take an active part in a patient’s treatment after speaking to the patient’s primary doctor.
Will My or My Loved One’s Primary Care Doctor(s) Continue To Be Involved if We Utilize Palliative Care Services?
Yes. The Palliative Care Consult Services team provides consultation to the patient’s primary doctors(s), who will continue to direct the patient’s care.
For more information or to request a consult, please speak with your caregiver or call (720) 848-6799.
“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