Palliative care is used to manage a disease or medical condition that is serious or life-limiting. The goal is to ease pain and other physical, emotional, or psychosocial symptoms.
Palliative care also aims to ease other distressing symptoms, like depression, anxiety, fatigue, insomnia, and shortness of breath. Palliative care provides advanced care planning and a support system to help you live a life that is as active, fulfilling, and pain-free as possible.
Palliative care may last for weeks, months, or years, and the relief of moderate to severe pain during that time can greatly improve quality of life. The biggest problem with palliative care is that many people are referred for care very late in the course of the disease. By starting this type of care early, and by using the right type of pain management, nearly all pain problems can be relieved or reduced.