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Palliative Care, Who Gets It?

551 views · Published 19 April 2015 · 1:56 · Indexed 1 November 2026

Channel: Lee Health · 2015 · Science & Technology

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It may be one of the most important fields of medicine that you’ve never heard of.  But as a rising number of people depend on palliative care, awareness about this new specialty is growing.

“Palliative care helps people with making complex medical decisions. We help coordinate the care, and we help people with symptom management,” says Dr. Colleen Tallen, director of Lee Memorial Health System’s palliative care program.

More than 90 million Americans suffer from a chronic disease. Studies show many of them would benefit from palliative care. Directed primarily at life-threatening conditions, it focuses on the patient’s well-being. 

“We are a complement to the physicians that are taking care of you to, to give that extra amount of time and energy around the other things that are important in life,” Dr. Tallen says.

So who really gets it? Palliative care is meant to combat confusion and streamline choices. Unlike hospice care which is associated with death, palliative care centers on life - quality of life- for anyone with terminal, chronic or acute conditions or injuries.

“Our team looks at somebody’s physical symptoms. They’re also looking at their spiritual, their emotional, their financial situation. Our team has experts in all of those areas. We have social work, dietician, pharmacist, physicians, nurse practitioners, that all look at the patient from their expertise.”

Among the most common conditions linked to palliative care are cancer, cardiovascular disease, kidney failure, COPD, AIDS and Alzheimer’s, along with auto-immune diseases like lupus.  Patients in the ICU may temporarily engage.

“We meet with a lot of people who didn’t know the day before they were going to be in an accident or have a heart attack. It’s very difficult to kind of take that all in,” says Dr. Tallen.

Providing comfort and support, the pal team is your friend in need

View More Health Matters video segments at leememorial.org/healthmatters/

Lee Memorial Health System in Fort Myers, FL is the largest network of medical care facilities in Southwest Florida and is highly respected for its expertise, innovation and quality of care. For nearly a century, we’ve been providing our community with everything from primary care treatment to highly specialized care services and robotic assisted surgeries.

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