Holistic/Palliative Management of Patient's Health Care and Home Situation in a Depressed Economy

In most middle and low economic nations, problem in the active management of health complaints is patients defaulting on follow-up appointments, attributable to financial constraints and cost of health services due to economic recession. This increases the danger of aggravation and deterioration of the condition and leads to re-hospitalisation. Most terminally ill patients and elderly prefer to be cared for at home by family caregivers or paid health professionals towards the end of their life. Holistic/palliative care is a key component of home health care. Current structure of health and social care services shows that the home is gradually becoming a significant location of long-term care. Holistic care as advocated by Florence Nightingale and others takes cognizance of the care of total human being looking at the spiritual, physical, social and psychosocial care of individual. Quality care for patients and their families can be achieved by establishing principles of holistic/palliative care as an integral part of daily practice both in the hospital and home care, as advocated by the WHO. Challenges in seeking to do this can be overcome if adequate funding is allocated for palliative care activities and setting up machineries for training of families on home care.