An Approach to Palliative Care in the ED

In Medical Concepts by Brent Thoma18 Comments

Palliative care is “the prevention and relief of suffering.” Given how much suffering that we see in the ED, emergency medicine physicians should have a working knowledge of some of the key skills in this specialty: managing pain and symptoms, delivering bad news, and helping families to make difficult decisions. These are three things that we do on a daily basis and could likely improve upon with increased focus.