[Problems and solutions of home care for a terminal cancer patient--cooperation as a team approach]

In order to have a terminal cancer patient spending fulfilling remaining of his life, the role of home care is important. Caremark clinical team, consists of nurses, pharmacists and clinical coordinators (CC), provides home care service for patients. We have faced many problems regarding providing care for our cancer patients, especially terminal patients, and solved the problems in cooperation with the physicians. The main problems which we have faced with care for terminal cancer patients are as follows: (1) For emergency case, such as sudden changes in patient condition, if a hospital where the patient used to stay can not accept his return, our clinical coordinator makes a contact with closer hospital and asks them to hospitalize the patient. (2) Concerns of a patient and his family increase when his pain is getting severe. For this case, our nurse gives his caregiver training on treatment method, and normal pain management care for the patient. Also our pharmacist talks with the patient and his family and try to reduce the pain by using more suitable drugs at each conditions. (3) A patient with serious conditions which requires long term home care, his family and caregivers have more burdens. For this problem we suggests them to use high touch home care providers, and also our nurse provides psychological care (counseling). We have solved other problems in cooperation with each specialists, and we are confident that we are able to provide better home care service for our patients.