Palliative Care Offers Choices
I give people choices. I think this is the main goal of palliative care: to offer people insight into what is important to them and help them achieve it.
L-R: Sarah Winans, Laura Morehouse, Laura Mason, Anne Cowles, Bess Reed, Kelly Lemieux, Elizabeth Newman, Katie Narey, Amber Grady, Joyce Dobbertin.
“Ten years ago, Dr. Mary Ready and I felt compelled to offer palliative services in the NEK. We became Board Certified in Palliative and Hospice Medicine and approached NVRH for help establishing a palliative department. We thought broadly: bring our knowledge and expertise to inpatients, outpatient clinic, nursing homes, the Norris Cotton Cancer Center, Dialysis and to patients’ homes if they are not ambulatory. NVRH backed our dream and offered us space and staff. We started in a very small office which has now expanded to a beautiful clinic space we share with ENT, Audiology, and Speech and Language. Dr. Ready has since moved primarily to Hospice, but Kelly Lemieux, NP; Anne Cowles, NP; Elizabeth Newman, MD; and myself are the clinical palliative staff. Recently someone asked me what I did. My reply is that I give people choices. I think this is the main goal of palliative care: to offer people insight into what is important to them and help them achieve it. We work with advanced care planning and help people decide what is important for them and how to best accomplish this. We are well connected with services people can tap into to help them improve the quality of their life. I am honored to work with the palliative staff and appreciate the open support from NVRH.”