Event Topic:
Join Dr Jim Whittle (Medical Oncologist) and a fantastic line up of palliative care experts to answer all your questions and to learn more about the role of palliative and supportive care in living life well after a diagnosis of a brain tumour.
Palliative care can be offered at any time after you are diagnosed with a brain tumour, alongside other standard treatment options, to ensure you experience the best quality of life for as long as possible. Palliative care is supportive care, which prevents, treats or controls the symptoms and side-effects of a serious illness and its treatment, and can also provide supports to your family.
Many people believe palliative care is only for the last few weeks or days of a person’s life, and it is true that it can play an important part in end of life care, but the main goal of palliative care services is to maintain your quality of life by identifying and helping you with any physical, emotional, cultural, social and spiritual needs at any point after your diagnosis with a serious illness.
About the speakers:
- Dr Jim Whittle, Medical Oncologist, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, member of the Brain Tumours Online team, will host this session.
- Professor Brian Le is the Director of Palliative Care at The Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre and The Royal Melbourne Hospital. Brian is a Physician specialist in both Palliative Medicine and Medical Oncology, and is a Professor at The University of Melbourne. Brian is co-chair of the Palliative Care Clinical Studies Collaborative, a cooperative trials group researching a range of therapies for palliative care symptoms.
- Professor Jenny Philip is the Chair of Palliative Care, University of Melbourne, and Physician of Palliative Medicine at St Vincent’s Hospital, Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre, and Royal Melbourne Hospital. Jenny is a palliative care clinician, researcher and educator with an interest in improving ways supportive and palliative care are delivered, ensuring care is underpinned by high quality evidence and that it is delivered by health professionals and carers who are well-trained, supported, compassionate, and passionate about what they do.
- John Doran is the Senior Manager at Melbourne City Mission Community Palliative Care Service. John has acquired vast and invaluable experience in over 25 years in both nursing, and health management, across Public Health and Not for Profit Organisations, with a predominant focus on delivering specialist palliative care services in both the hospital and community setting. For the last 6 years, John has led the highly regarded Melbourne City Mission Community Palliative Care Service, providing specialist palliative care to clients and carers residing in their own homes and within Aged Care homes in the service catchment.
- Chantelle Porter is an Enrolled Nurse working with Melbourne City Mission Palliative Care for the last 12 yrs. Her career started in Private Theatre, Aged Care, Orthopaedics and Oncology before transitioning into Palliative Care. Chantelle has found Community Palliative Care to be a place of personal growth, compassion, knowledge, and support. Chantelle takes great pride in providing high quality individualised care to clients and carers using a holistic approach, and at times thinking outside of the box to achieve the positive outcomes that clients and carers seek to reflect their journey and the journey of the bereaved there after.
Additional resources:
- You can search the Brain Tumours Online website using the search function (magnifying glass in top right-hand corner of the website) and the keyword “palliative” to see some key resources and personal stories on this topic.
- We will also be collating the resources mentioned by the panellists in this webinar and adding them to the website soon.
- More info about the Victorian Palliative Care phone advice service that Prof Brian Le mentioned can be found here: https://www.pcas.org.au/ or by calling 1800 360 000 (7am – 10pm).