Palliative Care Antecedents

Antecedents are “experiences you identify to be coming from other concepts” (Chinn & Kramer, 2008). They are events that lead to or cause an event to take place. In the case of Palliative care, long term illness or an incurable illness must be present. These would be the antecedents because they result in the patient having to undergo palliative care. Model Case Born 4 weeks premature, Silvia was what his parents called their miracle child. So when she gave birth to her 2nd child at the age of 32, her parents were simply ecstatic. Two years ago she was diagnosed with breast cancer. This she is told has now metastasized and involves her bones, which has been causing her severe pain. It’s difficult to take care of her two children and work while fighting for her life. Her oncologists have been trying to identify the chemotherapy drugs that can work for her in the hope of controlling the cancer. But even with all these her suffering is just getting worse. For her children’s Silvia uses all her strength to fight but she has been getting weaker and can barely get out of bed without help. Because of the pain she now spends most of her time curled up in bed, unable to eat or take care of her two young children. Her physician sends her to a specialty clinic in order to try and control her pain and keep her comfortable. This would at least help her resume some of her day-to-day activities. Palliative care clinics provide comfort to patients in order to restore some sort of norm in a patient’s life. This helps the patient be able to cope and take care of his/family.
Consequences are events that take place as a result of the patient being in palliative care. They imply causation. In most cases the ultimate result is death. Model Case
After three years fighting, HIV seemed to have been winning the fight. Michael had lost so much weight he was barely recognizable. Gone was the ambitious young man that dreamt or ruling the world. What had replaced him was simply a man