Developing a creative alliance with the 'person' beyond the 'patient' is a core tenet of effective palliative care. The need for a better understanding of how to develop active partnerships between service users and professionals has never been greater. This book examines progress thus far and attemts to delineate future challenges by bringing together a leading group of physicians, nurses, social workers, chaplains and psychologists who stress the importance of patient participation in palliative care. Recent developments are covered as well as bereavement issues and cultural differences....

A team of two practitioners in psychosocial palliative care and an academic have drawn together the work of twenty-eight highly experienced practitioners. Good Practices in Palliative Care: a psychosocial perspective provides detailed descriptions of innovatory practices and how they were developed, together with clear practice principles. This unique contribution to palliative care literature is suitable for a wide range of health and social care professionals at student and experienced levels and is written in a user-friendly style.

The use of narrative methods has a long history in palliative care, pioneered by Dame Cicely Saunders, founder of the hospice movement. Patients' stories can be used to make sense of the experience of illness and care, to create and express meaning, to mediate and reconstruct identifications, and to encapsulate the complex relatioships between the individual and their wider social and material contexts. Modern palliative care encourages user empowerment and involvement in end of life care strategies, with patient narratives becoming a powerful lobbying tool, and "personalized care" emerging...