Marie Curie Cancer Care and the British Heart Foundation (BHF) are working together to deliver better patient care to advanced heart failure patients in Poole, Bournemouth, Bradford and Airedale.
This service, called Better Together, provides the best possible care for chronic heart failure patients, allowing them to be cared for at home by both BHF and Marie Curie Nurses.
The two charities are confronting a problem: chronic heart failure patients currently spend much of their last month of life in hospital, which is usually not what the patient or their family wants.
Marie Curie Nurses, skilled in palliative care for the terminally ill, have a great deal of expertise in managing the symptoms that are common in patients with both cancer and heart failure, such as breathlessness, pain and fatigue. In heart failure patients, these symptoms can be difficult to manage.
Under the Better Together programme, heart failure patients identified as needing this sort of palliative care can now be referred by their BHF Nurse to a Marie Curie Nurse, who will visit them at home. Both teams of nurses will then work together to ensure both the patient’s medical and social needs are looked after.
For more information on this service you can download the following documents.
