{"id":412,"date":"2014-09-10T21:48:06","date_gmt":"2014-09-11T06:48:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=412"},"modified":"2014-09-11T02:01:57","modified_gmt":"2014-09-11T11:01:57","slug":"sept-10-the-patients-right-to-choose","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=412","title":{"rendered":"Sept. 10 &#8211; The Patient&#8217;s Right to Choose"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"shariff\" data-title=\"Sept. 10 &#8211; The Patient&#8217;s Right to Choose\" data-info-url=\"http:\/\/ct.de\/-2467514\" data-backend-url=\"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/wp-content\/plugins\/shariff-sharing\/backend\/index.php\" data-temp=\"\/tmp\" data-ttl=\"60\" data-service=\"gftr\" data-services='[\"googleplus\",\"facebook\",\"twitter\",\"reddit\",\"info\"]' data-image=\"\" data-url=\"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=412\" data-lang=\"en\" data-theme=\"colored\" data-orientation=\"horizontal\"><\/div><p><a href=\"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/deciding.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-413\" src=\"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/09\/deciding.jpg\" alt=\"deciding\" width=\"259\" height=\"195\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>One of the most frequent decisions I find patients or their family members making is \u201c<strong><em>When is the right time to consider comfort care or hospice?<\/em><\/strong>\u201d\u00a0 People have a difficult time with this decision because embedded with it is the realization that cure of the patient through medical intervention is no longer going to be the focus of treatment.\u00a0 The focus of treatment will be keeping the patient comfortable.\u00a0 Frequently this involves medicines to relieve pain.\u00a0 Federal law requires that patients be given information on all treatment options including comfort care and hospice.\u00a0 Many people don\u2019t want to mention these options until they feel comfortable with the decision.\u00a0 The problem with this tendency to wait to give the patient the option is that the right time to make the decision is when the patient is comfortable with making it.\u00a0 Waiting for a provider or family member to become comfortable before giving the patient the choice is not appropriate both due to legal mandates the right all human beings have to have dignity, even to have dignity in the process of dying.<\/p>\n<p>When I work with family members who are hesitant to even have the discussion I look for opportunities to point out that simply having the conversation does not mean a decision will be made today.\u00a0 But having the discussion gives the patient the gift of independence by being able to consider all the options that are available.\u00a0 I would never attempt to force comfort care or hospice on anyone.\u00a0 On the other hand having the conversation is valuable because you often learn from the patient was is truly important to them at that stage of life.\u00a0 If you are facing this struggle, please know having the discussion can bring peace to the patient and family members in ways you can\u2019t imagine unless you have been a part of this discussion previously.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>&nbsp; One of the most frequent decisions I find patients or their family members making is \u201cWhen is the right time to consider comfort care or hospice?\u201d\u00a0 People have a difficult time with this decision because embedded with it is the realization that cure of the patient through medical intervention is no longer going to &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/?p=412\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Sept. 10 &#8211; The Patient&#8217;s Right to Choose<\/span> <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-412","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=412"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":414,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/412\/revisions\/414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=412"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=412"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/cms.shelquist.us\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=412"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}