Cancer Pain Management And The Role Of Social Work

Having a personalised and holistic approach to a persons pain and discomfort needs good teamwork. E.g. Nurses and care workers may be able to help to support the person with physical pain. By using effective

Interprofessional working is defined as ‘persons belonging to a profession, relating between and among each other, for the mutual benefit of those involved’ (Day, 2006), whilst attempting to improve the quality of patient care and unite the multidisciplinary team to focus on patient centred, excellent care (Goodman & Clemow, 2010). Interprofessional workers in the healthcare setting can include nursing staff from all fields; adult, mental health, learning disabilities and paediatrics, as well as the wider multidisciplinary team within the ward setting, such as occupational therapists, physiotherapists, doctors, podiatrists, furthermore, expanding from the ward setting to include community nurses, social workers, health visitors and midwives. Interprofessional working enables and encourages these professionals to combine their values and beliefs to focus on the patients and to deliver excellent, patient centred care. This therefore allows them to share a common purpose and goal whilst combining their knowledge, skills and resources as a team (Day, 2006).

The movie “Wit” is a great educational tool for healthcare professionals in terms of dealing with terminally ill patients. It teaches that nurses and medical professionals should always remember that their patients are not a case nor illness nor experiment but rather human beings with souls and pains. Palliative care is one of the most disputed issues of worldwide importance. While bureaucrats in different countries are making laws on the use of palliative drugs, patients with excruciating pains learn how to “take deep breaths and be strong” (Nichols & Brokaw, 2001). That is what nurse Susie Monahan from “Wit” advises her dying patient Vivian Bearing suffering from unbearable pains due to stage IV ovarian cancer after eight painful rounds

As time goes by, people get infected with new diseases or current prevailing diseases. Consequently, new drugs are produced in an attempt to overcome these diseases, which results in patients with complex health needs. The complexity of the patients’ healthcare therefore needs to be addressed by more than one discipline. Interprofessional collaborative care is a type of health care that involves people from different professions working together and relying on each other to provide effective care to patients. Interprofessional collaborative care is important and predominantly a focus of the health care reform because it improves healthcare outcome for the patients and reduces disagreements between different professions. I was able to experience interprofessional care when my grandma was diagnosed with cancer. The physician and the pharmacist worked together in ensuring that she got the proper medication that would not have any side effects on her. In addition, the physician would call the pharmacy every two weeks to check on my grandma’s progress and to ensure that she had picked up her medications. Both my grandma and I were grateful because we felt that our needs were taken care of appropriately. Moreover, interprofessional health care is important in a curriculum because if helps the students to be better prepared to work as a team. This is achieved by teaching students about their own profession while receiving an understanding of the other professions and the roles they

A search of the Cinahl, Medline, Embase, BNI, psycINFO databases were made using the following key words, pain assessment, pain management, elderly, dementia and palliative care. The reference lists of identified papers were also searched for relevant articles. The use of many databases was deemed necessary due to

According to Allen et al. (2012), “millions of people with chronic illnesses endure unrelieved pain, uncontrolled physical symptoms and unresolved psychosocial or spiritual problems.” This issue occurs because palliative care is often considered a form of end-of-life care. Palliative care is a treatment that can be used for patients who suffer from chronic illnesses and diseases while receiving curative treatment. (Horowitz, Grambling & Quill, 2014) purposely states the misconceptions of palliative care and advocated for seriously ill patients that education must bring under control the misconceptions. Some patients do not receive appropriate symptom management because the palliative care treatment needed is often confused with end-of-life care. However, end-of-life care attempts to relieve pain and suffering when a disease is no longer responsive to curative treatment. Pain and suffering could ultimately be controlled or even eliminated through the proper utilization of palliative care. Patients who are not referred to palliative care in a timely manner is more likely to have poor quality of life, uncontrolled symptom management and increased amounts of visits to the emergency room during the disease process. Patients with life limiting illnesses bear the burden of increased discomfort and increased suffering. Nurses experience clinical practice issues and difficulties in the clinical setting during the delivery of comfort and symptom management. These issues

Hall and Waver ( 2001) defines Interprofessional as a group of professionals from different disciplines such as nurses, doctors, pharmacist that are working and communicating with each other while providing their knowledge, skills and attributes to enhance and support the contributions of others. Suter et al (2009) also said that the ability to work in an interprofessional team to convey collaborative, patient-centered care is an important aspect of professional practice that involves a possession of a particular set of competencies, such as communication skills. In relation to (Weinstein et al., 2003) Collaboration is the collection of knowledge, skills, values and motives which transforms to effective practice when applied by practitioners.

This week’s assigned readings focus on the importance of inter-professional teamwork and collaboration within the healthcare environment. Porter-O Grady describes in the readings that the complex nature of our healthcare system and the complex needs of patients call for a multifaceted approach to patient care (2013). This is greatly because current healthcare practices often necessitate for patients to obtain care from various care settings and from various specialties, making it nearly impossible for one discipline to effectively meet all of the patient’s needs (Porter-O Grady,2013). Interprofessional collaboration (IPC) supports a multifaceted approach to care and is defined by Kara et al. (2015) as the process through which different discplines

The author indicates that specialists in controlling certain types of pain, such as the pain of terminally ill cancer patients, believe that there are very few patients whose pain could not be adequately controlled. Although there are some ways to help a patient's pain, these methods unfortunately do not help. Many patients become sedated and cannot interact with other people or their environment (Hawkins 22). Clearly, all of these reasons are examples of self- deliverance and a liberty to choose. No patient should have to undergo a prolonged painful death.

World Health Organization (2010) affirms that the interprofessional education play key role in enhancement of patient outcome with collaborative practice. In Oncology floor where the multi systems of the body affected by the disease itself as well as due to the chemotherapy and radiation, one could witness the need for the interprofessional collaborative care is unavoidable. Timely provision of formulated care plan in action by the various professionals definitely yield the benefit of early recovery and positive patient outcome. Recently we started having the interprofessionals huddle at the bedside of the patient with primary nurse, respiratory therapist, physiotherapist, and occupational therapist for further care planning and implementing

Working in a team is an important responsibility by understanding each other’s role which may include doctor, nurse, occupational therapist, physiotherapist and many more. Team members divide the work based on their scope practice such as acute care, metal health care, homecare etc. Interprofessional collaboration practice is decision making and communicating between individuals for their patient’s health based on their knowledge and skills. It helps to promote habits, maximizing health resources, leading care to be safer with patient’s satisfaction and Canada’s health care (Kenaszchuk, Reeves, Nicholas, & Zwarenstein, 2010).

Pain, which is defined in its widest sense as an emotion which is the opposite of pleasure (White, 2004, p.455), is one of the major symptoms of cancer, affecting a majority of sufferers at some point during their condition (De Conno & Caraceni, 1996, p.8). The World Health Organization (WHO, 2009, online) suggests that relief from pain may be achieved in more than 90 percent of patients;

Assumptions And Principles Underlying Standards For Care of The Terminally Ill Introduction There is agreement that patients with life-threatening illnesses, including progressive malignancies, need appropriate therapy and treatment throughout the course of illness. At one stage, therapy is directed toward assessment and intervention in order to control and/or to cure such illness and alleviate associated symptoms. For some persons, however, the time comes when cure and remission are beyond current medical expertise. It is then that the intervention must shift to what is now often termed "palliative treatment," which is designed to control pain in the broadest sense and provide personal support for patients and family during

“Interprofessional working involves complex interactions between two or more members of different professional disciplines. It is a collaborative venture in which those involved share the common purpose of developing mutually negotiated goals achieved through agreed plans which are monitored and evaluated according to agreed procedures. This requires the pooling of knowledge and expertise to facilitate joint decision making based upon shared professional viewpoints” (Barrett, Sellman & Thomas, 2005, p18). How individuals collaborate and work towards a common goal for the benefit of the patient is essential for a swift recovery.

The pain from cancer will have an impact off psychology problem. “Find out what people need to know about the most common types of cancer treatment, learn how they work and why they are