[Life supports for terminal cancer patients]

An In-home medical care center was established at Tokyo Women's Medical University in 1997, and supported 14 cases that were treated at home. According to these cases, we understood that the terminal cancer patients and their family had various ways of thinking, especially misgivings about their surroundings. Causes of the misgivings were divided into 6 elements, such as experience, environment, situations, patients themselves, information and time management. To remove these uneasy feelings, we thought that our medical care center should play an important role in providing early consultation for cancer patients and their families. We concluded that the most important thing was collaboration with regional medical staff.