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Informational/Educational Report
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Wound management and palliative care: the process of developing programs to meet the unique needs of the palliative care patient Patricia Ghikas PT, MEd, GCS, CWS Wound management for patients in need of palliative care presents a unique challenge to wound care clinicians. Although healing may not be a goal for the palliative patient, the plan of care must be individualized and comprehensive, taking into account the goals of the patient. Generally, for wound management, palliative care is directed toward management of wound related pain,preventing infection, management of drainage, odor control and, when possible, decreasing wound size. A properly designed palliative wound management plan can achieve these goals and allow the patient to reach individual goals. The patient and caregivers can then focus valuable time on non-health care related activities, therefore maximizing quality of life, the major goal of palliative care..The process of program development of a palliative wound management program is important to understand in order to develop and implement best practice standards for this population. Program development steps are: definition of the population, answering the question, ÒWho are our palliative care patients?Ó; program goal setting, definition of the multidisciplinary components of the program including clinical roles, determination of the equipment and products needed for program success, promoting staff competence and development of wound care expertise, determination of program costs, and finally, development of outcomes measures and continuous quality improvement initiatives to assure long term program success.. . Alvarez OM, Meehan M, Ennis WJ, et al. Chronic wounds: palliative management for the frail population. WOUNDS. 2002;14(8 suppl):5SÐ27S McKee N. Management of wound painÑa topic in its infancy. Continuing professional learning (CPL). University of Saskatchewan, Canada, 2005 Ennis WJ, Meneses P. Palliative care and wound care: 2 emerging fields with similar needs for outcomes data. WOUNDS. 2005:17(4):99Ð104 Sibbald G et al. EWMA Conference, Pisa Satellite Symposium. Wound Pain Management: An Interdisciplinary Case-Based Approach. Saturday 24 May 2003 Ennis WJ. Healing: can we? must we? should we? Ostomy Wound Manage. 2001:47(9):6Ð8. |
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