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Palliative Care in Oncology pp 123–133Cite as

The Final Phase

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Abstract

Palliative care aims to improve the quality of life of patients and their families facing life-threatening illness. An overall treatment strategy not only includes prevention, assessment, and treatment of pain and other symptoms but also integrates psychological, social, emotional, and spiritual problems of the patient and his/her relatives. The large majority of patients being managed in palliative medicine are suffering from incurable, far-advanced, and progressive cancer. Pain is the major source of anxiety and distress at the end of life, particularly in cases of end-stage cancer. As in any stage of the disease, cancer pain treatment requires standardized guidelines adapted to the WHO’s three-step ladder of cancer pain relief (WHO 1996). Burdens and suffering of patients and relatives should be minimized, and physical, psychosocial, and spiritual symptoms must be treated even in the terminal phase.

You matter because you are you. You matter to the last moment of your life, and we will do all we can to help you not only to die peacefully, but also to live until you die.(Cicely Saunders 1976)

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Palliative Medicine, University Medical Center, Göttingen, Germany

    Friedemann Nauck MD

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  1. Friedemann Nauck MD
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Correspondence to Friedemann Nauck MD .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Palliative Medicine, University Medical Center, Göttingen, Germany

    Bernd Alt-Epping

  2. Department of Palliative Medicine, University Medical Center, Göttingen, Germany

    Friedemann Nauck

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Nauck, F. (2015). The Final Phase. In: Alt-Epping, B., Nauck, F. (eds) Palliative Care in Oncology. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-46202-7_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-662-46202-7_9

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-662-46201-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-662-46202-7

  • eBook Packages: MedicineMedicine (R0)

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