Hospice Palliative Care Book Reviews &
The Palliative Care Book of the Month
Dr. Woodruff, MD
(Australia)
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Book of the Month
IN MOTHER TERESA’S HOUSE
A Hospice Nurse in the Slums of Calcutta
Rosemary Dew
BookSurge, 2006
212 pp
ISBN 1-4196-3130-6
RRP $US16.99, £7.40
Rosemary Dew sounds like a remarkable woman. Wife and mother, with degrees in writing and Slavic languages, formerly an FBI agent and a consultant to the US Department of Defense, she graduated in nursing one month shy of her 50th birthday and went on to become a certified hospice and palliative care nurse. This is her story of the month she spent working at Kaligaht, the House for Sick and Dying Destitutes, in Calcutta.
Reading this book rekindled the problems that I have had with the aura that surrounds the legend of Mother Teresa. In 1994, the editor of The Lancet criticised the lack of any attempt to diagnose the curable from the incurable, and the lack of any strong analgesics for severe pain. Examples of these turn up in Dew’s book. The one patient who needs to go to the hospital cannot be taken because that would mean you have to take all the patients to the hospital. To have no strong analgesics for patients in severe pain, but to tell them that Jesus is kissing them, I find unacceptable. My views remain coloured by Christopher Hitchens’ excellent critique The Missionary Position. Mother Teresa in Theory and Practice (Verso, 1995).
That said, you will understand that I do not agree with everything Dew has to say. But this is a wonderful book. It is well written and the images vivid. The warmth and devotion of the carers is palpable. The spirituality (by which I am not referring to Catholicism) overflows. I would recommend this book to anybody who works in hospice and palliative care. You will not agree with everything she says, but it will make you think and reflect.
Roger Woodruff
Director of Palliative Care, Austin Health, Melbourne, Australia
(November 2007)
Book Reviews
LIVING AND DYING WITH DEMENTIA
Dialogues about Palliative Care
Neil Small, Katherine Froggatt and Murna Downs
Oxford University Press, 2007
248 pp
ISBN 978-0-19-856687-8
RRP £29.95, $US57.50
I, for one, often feel inadequate when confronted with a patient with significant dementia, because so much of what I am used to doing relies on two-way communication. This book explores what is known about the experience of dying with dementia, including accounts from patients and carers. It examines a ‘person-centred’ approach to care and the specific possibilities that might bring and the challenges to be faced. The penultimate chapter discusses what a good death with dementia might be. This book will be a useful resource for those who deal with patients with dementia and for palliative care workers whose practice brings them into contact with these patients.
PALLIATIVE AND AGED CARE
A Guide to Practice
Rosalie Hudson and Margaret O’Connor
Ausmed Publications, 2007
212 pp
ISBN 9780977515349
RRP $US59.95, £29, $AU79.95
The overlap between aged care and palliative care, and the need to apply the principles of palliative care to any person facing death as the result of a life-threatening illness, probably doesn’t need to be sold. This book, written by two of my colleagues in Melbourne, aims to provide a practical guide on how to maximise the quality of life for older people until they die. What impressed me about this book was that the discussion was kept at a relatively simple level (issues were not unnecessarily made more complicated), giving a clear message, which in turn was very practical. I also liked chapter 2, which is about how administrators should lead and make sure services are adequately resourced in order to provide optimal care in this setting. There are also chapters about advance care planning, ethics, physical care, advanced dementia, holistic care, complementary care and family care. This book is a practical stepping-stone in the slowly evolving partnership between palliative care and aged care. I would recommend it to anybody who works in aged care and to any palliative care workers who have involvement with aged care.
CHRONIC PAIN
Gary W. Jay
Informa Health Care, 2007
304 pp
ISBN 978-0-8493-3046-9
RRP $US149.95, £74.99, $AU225.00
This book is about chronic non-cancer pain, which is described as a disease like diabetes or hypertension, in that for the most part it cannot be cured. It can, however, be successfully treated and controlled and the importance of a multidisciplinary approach to management is emphasised. The book starts with chapters on anatomy and physiology and some of the molecular bases of pain. There are chapters on the common non-cancer pain syndromes including myofascial pain, fibromyalgia, neuropathic pain, and tension-type headache. There are chapters on medications and also on psychological approaches to care. The book is well set out, contains a lot of information, and is well referenced. However, I have to say that in comparison with similar volumes, it is over-priced.
Roger Woodruff
Director of Palliative Care, Austin Health, Melbourne, Australia
(November 2007)
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