As a part of our training, we had the opportunity to discuss palliative care for incurable illnesses. The aim of palliative care is to fight unreasonable obstinacy, to promote the patients’ autonomy and to allow them to refuse treatment.
The 10Th of October, 2018 is celebrated the World Palliative Care Day to support people in this environment. This day was initiated in 2005 by the Association World Hospice & Palliative Care Day, which invites services and citizens to build an action of awareness and information for all. We have discovered the existence of a show played in honor of this day. In Loire-Atlantique, thematic evenings have been organized for 14 years and have brought together more than 4,000 people. This performance has emerged thanks to the investment of professionals and volunteers. The author of the play “Hunger for Life” has been fully invested in the construction of the show by following the volunteers of the association Jusqu’à la mort, accompagner la vie (“Accompany Life until Death”). Scenes are played by the company Sketch Up, which sets up and interprets paintings. They transcribe the reality of the various exposed situations in the form of sketches evoking difficult realities.
We have seen several situations, we will describe below three of them that marked us the most :
- The first scene takes place in a waiting room in the hospital. It clearly explains the role of the patients’ companions at the end of life. There are three characters: a patient coming for a check-up, an end-of-life companion and a sick elderly person. The companion decides to be there for others, and this voluntarily. This shows great human qualities, as being there for others without expecting anything in return. The patient expresses the misunderstanding of this willingness to help and to support someone in a difficult event as death. He also displays the discomfort that he feels being by the side of a sick person, particularly because of the fear of developing a serious illness in return.
- The second scene exposes a situation where a man comes to visit his grandmother. This elderly person wanted to discuss with him about something that was important to her. However, her grandson was clearly distracted by external elements such as a cobweb, a phone call, etc. This scene is bringing to light the fact that we don’t take time to listen to people who are at the end of their life. It is necessary to take care of people we love, and even if sometimes we don’t have enough time we need to do it.
- The last scene takes place between an elderly person Germaine, suffering from a neuro–degenerative disease, and two hospital professionals. Germaine is in the hall, asking if there is someone there. A caregiver is trying to get her back to bed, but she refuses. She seems to be reliving her past, speaking about her home village. Then, the caregiver is becoming insistent and adopts an inappropriate behavior toward this patient who refuses. Another caregiver, who was about to leave, then came and took the time to enter into the patient’s game to get her cooperation. Being listening to the patient and showing interest to her allowed the second caregiver to reach Germaine back to her room. This scene questions the main problems of our time, which are the lack of staff and the impatience of caregivers caused by an overload of work. It also reminds us that an elderly person remains a full person with desires and needs.
All this humor invested to deal with a difficult subject is very rewarding and very significant. This play is very revealing of the negative attitudes adopted by visitors, sometimes unconsciously, towards the people at the end of life and the individuals that are accompanying them. The fact of playing delicate situations, often encountered in many structures, allows us to question ourselves and to become more aware of the inappropriate behaviors that we can sometimes adopt. The actors presented situations that we occasionally discuss in the media as the sometimes-inappropriate attitudes of caregivers towards individuals at end of life. This play evokes subject we don’t necessarily think, just as the lack of time that we are able to give to our loved ones at the end of their life. This was very interesting because many people have already experienced this situation, whether they were caregivers or not.
The show leads us to reflect about behaviors and attitudes we could adopt. However, we must emphasize that it is sometimes difficult for caregivers to take the time needed for each patient, because as it is often mentioned in the media, there is a lack of staff in many structures, thus making the working conditions of the staff-caregiver very complicated and forcing them to give only very little time to each patient.
In conclusion, this show, and therefore this world day of palliative care, leads us to question ourselves and also allows to develop the knowledge of each about the existing devices. In addition, this underlines the importance of services or teams specialized in palliative care.
Lauranne ABSIL et Anaïs RAUD, M2 PPCECC
Keywords
- Palliative care
- A show
- Death
- Caregiver
- Negative attitudes
Words we have learned:
- Care = Soin
- Action of awareness = Action de sensibilisation
- Volunteers = Bénévoles
- Misunderstanding = Incompréhension
- Willingness = Volonté
- Caregiver = Aidant