The World Health Organization (WHO) defines palliative care for children is the active total care of the child’s body, mind and spirit and also involves giving support to the family. With the social and medical advances, more infants or children can live longer with medical complex condition. Many of them are receiving extensive medical and nursing care to sustain their lives. With the innovation of health care, the Paediatric Palliative Care was highlighted and aims to improve quality of life of children and support the families.
Although Adult Palliative Care was well developed in Hong Kong, Paediatric Palliative Care services were underdevelopment. It may be due to the relatively low demand.
The three weeks observational visit of Paediatric Palliative Care in SickKids enables us to broaden our vision in palliative care.
SickKids provides facilities which promote the child and family-centred care to patient and family. The hospital was decorated with child-friendly environment with colourful wall painting. Family space such as Marnie’s lounge, Samsung Space and Women’s Auxiliary Play Park for patient and family members to play and rest in a safe environment and experience normalcy while at hospital. Family Centre provides a lot of information about the disease management and prevention.
The Paediatric Advanced Care Team in SickKids provided child and family-centred care. They planned and delivered care collaboratively by an interdisciplinary team. The purpose was to provide optimal comfort and quality palliative care. They discussed the goals of care which reflected the values and preferences of life-limiting child and their family members to maximize the quality of life of the child.
Acute Pain Service in SickKids provided services on prevention and management of pain. Through the guidelines of pain assessment, they used appropriate pain management to minimize the pain.
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