Palliative Care Australia
Services offered
Palliative care
Overview
Palliative care aims to maintain quality of life and can be helpful at any stage of advanced cancer.
It covers a range of services that include symptom management, help organising equipment for home, and emotional support.
The palliative care team can support you as your caring role changes.
What's on this page
What is palliative care?
Palliative care is person-centred care that helps people with a progressive, life-limiting illness to live as comfortably as possible. The goal of palliative care is to improve quality of life for both the person with cancer, and their family and carers.
Palliative care doesn’t mean giving up hope. It is not just for end-of-life care – it may be beneficial for people at any stage of advanced cancer.
For more information, see Palliative care.
Palliative care services
The palliative care team will help identify services that can offer emotional and practical support to you in your caring role. These may include:
- relief of the person’s symptoms (e.g. pain, breathlessness, nausea)
- help organising equipment for home (e.g. mobility aids, special beds)
- help with discussions about sensitive issues and suitable care options
- links to other services such as home help and financial support
- support for people to meet cultural obligations
- counselling, grief and bereavement support
- support for emotional, social and spiritual concerns
- referrals to respite care services.
If the person chooses not to have active treatment for the cancer, palliative care can help ensure any symptoms are well controlled and the person is comfortable. The palliative care team can help you understand what is happening and what happens next.
Our cancer care team talked about how palliative care could make my husband’s life easier and more meaningful. I found it so useful to know that help was available when I needed it
How palliative care works
When to start
When to start
Palliative care is useful at all stages of advanced cancer and can be given alongside active treatment for cancer. Connecting with the palliative care team early on can help improve quality of life.
Who provides care
Who provides care
Palliative care may be led by a GP, nurse practitioner or community nurse or, if the person’s needs are complex, by a specialist palliative care team.
Where care is provided
Where care is provided
The palliative care team will work with you and the person you are caring for to plan the best place for care. This may be at home supported by community palliative care services, in hospital, at a residential aged care facility or in a palliative care unit (hospice).
Your role
Your role
Carers are considered part of the palliative care team. With the agreement of the person being cared for, the palliative care team will include you in decisions about their care and treatment.
Accepting help
Accepting help
If you have been providing most of the person’s care, it can be difficult to let other people take over some tasks. As the caring demands are likely to keep increasing as the cancer progresses, accepting help can mean you can spend more quality time with the person you’re caring for.
Relevant support
Carer Gateway
Services offered
Mental health support (general)
Everyday tasks
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