Departments

Medical Departments

Supportive & Palliative Care

Mission

Everybody will agree on the absolute medical and ethical necessity to provide optimal palliative care to our patients who come to the end of their life.
The "Palliative Medicine" has to be considered as a speciality of the Internal Medicine. When managing cancer patients as in Bordet Institute, it requests an oncological expertise but obviously, human qualities are essential for being successful in this discipline too.
In our country, there are still few palliative care units but currently, they quickly develop.
The Jules Bordet Institute has the chance to have an interdisciplinary team composed of medical oncologists trained in palliative medicine, a psychiatrist specialized in psycho-oncology, nurses among whom one is specialized in pain management, three psychologists, two dieticians, two kinesitherapists, one stoma therapist, not mentioning the occasional help of speech therapists and of other Paramedical staff.
Recently, we have opened a "Acute Unit of Supportive and Palliative Care" which tells for the moment eight beds (four rooms with one bed and two rooms with two beds).

Why an "Acute" Unit while palliative medicine rather means chronicity and extended stay at the hospital ? The management of a patient by our team does not automatically mean that he will be transferred to the Unit as each individual situation is discussed with the patient's primary physician. Moreover, all possible decision of transfer is done in accordance with the patient and his family.
The Palliative Care Unit is different from other units where the predominant support is at the psychological level. We certainly do not neglect this essential aspect but the Unit has rather the aim to try to solve disorders such as pain considered as "uncontrollable", digestive obstruction, uncontrollable vomiting, serious breakdown, organic mental disorder, serious dyspnea , threat of lethal hemorrhage, really difficult end of life, etc.

That our patient could go back to their room of better to home is one of our main goals. Of course, it is important to pay attention to the family, social and individual environment which is really different from a patient to another. We always favoured the collaboration with the family physician and we try to develop it as much as possible.
In our Clinic, our research projects essentially deal with the control of pain, of the cancer cachexia and of the nervous breakdown linked to the disease.

 

 

Person in charge : Pr. Razavi Darius