Dad’s at PEACE

I received a call from the hospital about dad from his doctor. She was following up our discussion regarding dad’s care and wanted to further the idea of promoting a palliative approach to it along the lines I had suggested, and so we arranged to me yesterday afternoon along with dad.

Well it turns out that Kings College Hospital Trust (ie the group that run the hospital dad is in) have established a protocol for this very situation. It’s called the PEACE plan (‘Proactive Elderly Persons Advisory Care’ plan).

The plan takes for the form of a document to help health care staff deliver the most appropriate form of care to people who are anticipated to be in the last year of their life. It defines what the best care might look like for dad, as and when his health starts to decline further, and covers topics like feeding, infections and treatments.

Dad, I and the doctor discussed things and then the doctor and I went away to complete the forms. Dad was a lot happier by the time I left and is looking forward to coming home now knowing that his healthcare priority is now comfort and palliative in nature. (Oh, and I gave him a haircut).