End of Life Support

Harlington Hospice works in close partnership with GPs, district nurses and hospital teams, providing support for patients in need of specialist palliative care.

What is Palliative Care?

Palliative care is provided to patients with life-limiting diseases when their disease is not responsive to curative treatment and the patient has a limited life expectancy.

It’s provided by generalists (GPs, primary care teams or hospital practitioners) when they need basic palliative care or by palliative care  specialists when patients develop complex needs despite the initiation of basic palliative care.

The World Health Organisation defines palliative care as an approach that improves the quality of life of patients and their families facing the problems associated with life-threatening illness, through the prevention and relief of suffering by means of early identification, assessment and treatment of pain and other physical, psychosocial and spiritual problems.

Palliative care:

• provides relief from pain and other distressing symptoms;
• affirms life and regards dying as a normal process;
• intends neither to hasten or postpone death;
• integrates the psychological and spiritual aspects of patient care;
• offers a support system to help patients live as actively as possible until death;
• offers a support system to help the family cope during the patient's illness and in their own bereavement;
• uses a team approach to address the needs of patients and their families, including bereavement counselling, if indicated;
• will enhance quality of life, and may also positively influence the course of  illness;
• is applicable early in the course of illness, in conjunction with other therapies that are intended to prolong life, such as chemotherapy or radiation therapy, and includes those investigations needed to better understand and manage distressing clinical complications

Referral - [email protected]

We care for people with many different types of progressive illnesses such as cancer, heart, lung and kidney diseases and also neurological conditions such as motor neurone disease and dementia. It is the needs of our patients that matter to us rather than the diagnosis.

Our End of Life care is offered completely free of charge.

Who can refer into our [email protected] Service?

• GPs
• District Nurses
• Clinical Nurse Specialists
• Other Palliative Care professionals
• Social Services

Referral criteria - [email protected]

• The patient is aged over 18 and lives in the London Borough of Hillingdon and/or is registered with a GP in the London Borough of Hillingdon.
• The patient has a progressive disease that cannot be cured, or the patient does not want treatment and they are competent to make that decision. Any life-limiting disease is appropriate for our services including non-cancer conditions.
• The patient has complex problems including symptom control, emotional, psychological, social or spiritual issues that are important to the patient.
• The patient is entering the final End of Life phase.
• Assessments suggest that care of the patient would be best managed through palliative care in the community, through our day services and/or our Hospice at Home services.
• The patient must have consented to their referral, if they are competent to do so.

Harlington Care Services

Harlington Care is a group of services provided by Harlington Hospice for people with long term conditions and high dependency needs.

Harlington Care services are aimed at supporting patients who are at risk of being admitted to hospital when they could stay at home with appropriate care and also patients who could be discharged from hospital because they are medically stable, but are delayed in hospital because they need high dependency care and/or further assessment to support them returning home.

Who can refer into our Harlington Care services?

• Social Services Teams only

Referral criteria - Harlington Care Services 

• The patient is aged over 18 and lives in the London Borough of Hillingdon and/or is registered with a GP in the London Borough of Hillingdon.
• The patient has a long term condition that requires high dependency care.
• The patient's needs could be supported by social care in order to prevent admission to hospital.
• The patient’s needs require high dependency social care support on discharge from hospital.

Other services that may help 

Hospice UK

Marie Curie 

Macmillan