| Abstract: |
Palliative and hospice care are medical subspecialties that provide specialized care for people living with serious illness. The focus of both is to relieve symptoms and improve quality of life for patients and their families and to guide patients and their families in discussions of goals of care and advanced directives. Palliative care can be initiated at any stage of illness; hospice care is generally reserved for patients who are in the last 6 months of their lives. It is important for primary care physicians to identify patients who will benefit from such care early on: Palliative care has been shown not only to enhance quality of life but also, in some cases, to prolong it. The most common symptoms addressed in palliative care are pain, shortness of breath, nausea/vomiting, and constipation. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022. |
