Palliative care.
Elderly people are the most vulnerable population in the community. Despite growing old being a privilege it is accompanied by health complications. Most body systems among them musculoskeletal which affects the cardiopulmonary system which are the vital systems which support life degenerate (World Health Organization, 2015). The defensive mechanism of the body tends to weaken with age making them prone to various conditions especially the opportunistic diseases. With reduced body muscle mass they experience general weakness inhibiting mobility.
It is evident that many elderly people in America die while in healthcare providing facilities against their wishes. Most of them would have preferred to die at the comfort of their homes in presence of entire family members. They assume this to be more peaceful and that they are not bothering the rest of the family members with hospital expenses. On the other side, the rest of the family members feel taking them to health care facilities is safer. To them, it is a show of dignity to the elderly (Goodman et al., 2016). Most of the elderly people develop respiratory complications as they approach the end of life hence need mechanical support. Few people can afford to install and maintain them at home and the machines end up useless after the individual passes. This makes most families to take the elderly to health care facilities.
End of life care desired by the elderly people has to be considered while taking care of them. Each elderly people have unique requirements according to their wishes hence need to be handled differently in the settings of their desire, mostly at home. In the hospital setting, elderly people are more likely to physical care than psychological, emotional and spiritual support which they need most. This will hasten their death (Mozley, 2017). It is the role of the nurse to ensure the elderly receive appropriate care in line with their wills. This can be achieved through advocating for the old people to share what their end of life care options are to the family or caregivers in advance. Also, the nurse ought to educate the caregivers on the significance of offering services in line with their desires. It is the work of the nurse to ensure the concerned family members understand the state of health at this stage of life. this will enable them to easily accept and go for home-based care services to manage the pain and symptoms of the elderly at home while ensuring comprehensive care to the elderly patients.
References.
Goodman, C., Dening, T., Gordon, A. L., Davies, S. L., Meyer, J., Martin, F. C., … & Gage, H.
(2016). Effective health care for older people living and dying in care homes: a realist
review. BMC health services research, 16(1), 269.
Mozley, C. (2017). Towards Quality Care: outcomes for older people in care homes. Routledge.
World Health Organization. (2015). World report on ageing and health. World Health
Organization.
