End-of-Life Fatigue

Paper Summary:

This paper discusses how the end-of-life phase is the most important and testing time for all the people involved, from the patient to the relatives and the care providers, and how understanding the needs and the mental state of the patient is of utmost importance in delivering palliative care. It looks at how good, palliative care is all about reducing the distress of the patient as much as possible and helping them attain a peaceful end. It also examines how, in order to make the end of life a smooth and relatively trouble-free experience for the patient, it is necessary that nurses, relatives, and all other volunteers are properly educated and prepared for the eventuality.

From the Paper:

"In palliative care the role of the nurse is most significant as we are more concerned with treatment of symptoms rather than perception or diagnosis. Fatigue and depression in end stage is not homogenous in nature making it difficult to understand the underlying psychopathology. Furthermore most people fall into "dysphoria" (demoralizing syndrome) in which case clinical evaluation is inappropriate, as the condition might have resulted from problems of an entirely different nature. This is more complicated by the prevalence of other mental disorders like dementia and drug induced mood swings. Nurses need to be well trained in pattern recognition and logical assessment of the condition and take suitable action to solve these problems."

More papers on End-of-Life Fatigue:

• Book Review # 142890 : "End-of-Life Decision-Making"
• Essay # 60306 : "End-of-Life Care"
• Research Paper # 91857 : "Religion and Spirituality in End-of-life Care"

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