Psycho-Oncology in Palliative and End-of-Life Care provides expert advice and clinical management guidelines on the impact of advanced cancer and its treatment on the life and wellbeing of a patient in palliative and end-of-life care. Employing a practical toolkit format, this volume addresses a variety of key challenges including: discussions of death and dying, poor prognoses, wishes and values of the dying person, advance care plans, anxiety, demoralization and problems with coping, depression and delirium, the needs of partners, children, families, and caregivers, and spiritual and bereavement care. Each chapter considers presenting symptoms, differential diagnoses and assessment methods to achieve the best diagnosis, so that a detailed formulation can be developed for each person that guides a comprehensive management plan. Each section concludes with professional and service issues ranging from ethical dilemmas, legal requirements, cultural needs, and training and service development issues, through to basic human rights. Part of the Psycho-Oncology Care: Companion Guides for Clinicians series, this concise pocket guide is a resource for oncology specialists, psycho-oncologists in training, consultant nurse specialists and nurse practitioners, and allied health professionals to use as a quick reference in everyday practice. Pitched at intermediate to advanced level skills, this companion guide can be used as a standalone, or alongside existing oncology and psycho-oncology training programs.

Psychiatric, or psychosocial, palliative care has transformed palliative medicine. Palliation that neglects psychosocial dimensions of patient and family experience fails to meet contemporary standards of comprehensive palliative care. While a focus on somatic issues has sometimes overshadowed attention to psychological, existential, and spiritual end-of-life challenges, the past decade has seen an all encompassing, multi-disciplinary approach to care for the dying take hold. Written by internationally known psychiatry and palliative care experts, the Handbook of Psychiatry in Palliative Medicine is an essential reference for all providers of palliative care, including psychiatrists, psychologists, mental health counselors, oncologists, hospice workers, and social workers.