In its continuing effort to provide more and better patient services to the region, Valley View Hospital (VVH) in Glenwood Springs recently established an outpatient Palliative Care Clinic in the outpatient medical building adjacent to the hospital. The new facility complements the inpatient palliative treatment that VVH has been providing for some six years.
Dr. Shane Lieberman, a board-certified palliative medicine physician, came to VVH from the Denver area about a year ago with the goal of setting up the outpatient facility.
“We opened our doors for the first time in July, at first for one day a week; that has now been expanded to two,” he told The Sopris Sun.
What is palliative care?
The word “palliative” comes from the Latin root “palliere,” meaning “to cloak,” and the dictionary defines it as “reducing the severity of a disease or condition without curing it.” The VVH website characterizes it as “specialized medical service focused on alleviating pain, anxiety and other distressing symptoms in patients facing a serious or life-threatening illness.” It can be used, for example, to help patients experiencing side effects from medical treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation.
Palliative care is often thought of in terms of hospice care — end-of-life treatment given to individuals nearing death which focuses on care, comfort and quality of life but does not include treatment of the disease or condition. Indeed, it got its start with the origins of hospice care in Britain in the late ‘60s. Canadian physician Dr. Balfour Mount, who established an early North American hospice service in Montreal in 1973, coined the term “palliative care” the next year.
The clinic
However, as Dr. Lieberman made clear, “All hospice care is palliative care, but not all palliative care is hospice care.” He stipulated that the VVH clinic “is not directly involved with hospice care” and does not “coordinate hospice care,” noting that there are specific hospice facilities for that treatment. What he and the rest of the staff at the clinic are developing at the clinic is a “supportive care service for people facing a life-threatening illness … [to] help them cope with this stage of their life” as they undergo treatment for the condition.
He emphasized the objective of “building relationships with people” and the importance of one-on-one interactions. “It’s really about relationships — getting to know and focusing on the whole person,” and then helping them chart a treatment regimen. “Patients feel more supported and better managed” with palliative care.
Dr. Lieberman had a varied life before becoming a physician, which included working as a CPA, obtaining a graduate degree in German and leading a jazz-funk band for several years. However, he decided to go to medical school to “be of service on a daily basis” and was drawn to palliative care for that reason.
The approach the clinic’s staff has taken means that they can spend more time with individual patients. Consultative appointments are typically an hour long, and Dr. Lieberman says that he may see only “six or seven patients in a day; maybe 40 or 50 per month.” The staff can build relationships with patients that will “follow on for years and years.”
Dr. Lieberman explained that before the clinic was operating, palliative care was an option at the hospital “only for inpatients who were already in crisis. Something is going wrong with their health but not necessarily end-of-life. They are sick and vulnerable — not always the best time to have meaningful (though often necessary) conversations.”
He continued, “With the opening of the clinic, we can help build our relationship and start these conversations earlier and in an atmosphere that is more comfortable and won’t necessarily feel like any decisions need to be made immediately.” As an example, he said that the clinic staff works closely with patients in VVH’s Calaway-Young Cancer Center. He concluded, “I think the clinic is a great addition for our community.”
For more information, contact the clinic at 970-384-4220.