Good Shepherd Community Care provides the in-patient palliative care service at Steward St. Elizabeth's Medical Center (SEMC) and Carney Hospitals. Our palliative care service at both hospitals is provided by a certified Palliative Physician and Nurse Practitioners who are on-site at each location to offer a consistent presence and availability to patients, families, and clinicians, as well as provide community-based follow-up visits to those patients and families who need it.
Palliative Care in both hospitals complements other medical specialists using a holistic, patient and family-centered approach. Our consultative services enhance patients’ quality of life by helping to manage the challenges of serious illness (physical, emotional, social, and spiritual) and supporting patient choice and access to information. Palliative care consults can support clinicians, patients and families with complex symptom management, conversations about the nature/progression of illness, and discussions about options and goals for care and, is structured to ease transitions between the hospital the community often reducing the length of hospital stays and the likelihood of re-hospitalization.
Palliative care is appropriate at every stage of the disease process and is available to patients and their loved ones whether seeking aggressive treatment or not.
