When our pets enter the last stages of their lives, it can become important to consider palliative care and planning for the transition toward the end of life. Palliative care focuses on maintaining the quality of life through the use of medications and environmental changes that provide support for conditions such as a decrease in mobility or a loss of cognition (senility).
Because it prioritizes managing pain and maintaining comfort, palliative treatment has become an increasingly popular option for pet owners seeking to maximize their pet’s quality of life when the disease process is not curable.
Scheduling an appointment with us at Ballantyne Vet to discuss these changes and how they can be managed can be an important step in helping your pet maximize its comfort and happiness.
It may be difficult to acknowledge that our friends are entering the latter stages of their lives. Having a thoughtful conversation with your veterinarian about both how to help and what to expect can make a tremendous difference in your pet’s quality of life as well as offer you some peace of mind through understanding these processes.
Palliative care, sometimes called comfort care, is a thoughtful evaluation of your pet’s chronic medical conditions from the point of view of maximizing their quality of life through the use of medications and environmental changes without the expectation of improvement or cure.
Palliative pet care is not about extending lifespan but allowing a pet to live happily with the people they love as the end approaches.
Depending on the pet and its circumstances, palliative care typically lasts from days to months. However, pet palliative care is an inherently temporary measure, and you should never forget its ultimate goal: a comfortable, fulfilling life for you and your pet.
When the time comes, and palliative care is no longer effective, we can help you make considered, compassionate choices for your pet.
Ballantyne Vet employs palliative care strategies to treat many diseases, conditions, and illnesses. Conditions treatable with palliative methods tend to be slowly progressive or degenerative rather than sudden, acute illnesses. Some common conditions include:
When done correctly, palliative care can be an essential and enriching part of a pet’s end-of-life care journey, providing comfort to both the pet and the pet owner.
It can be hard to decide to stop seeking active treatment for your pet. But in cases where a cure is not possible, palliative care offers a compassionate option for at-home pet care.
Treatment seeking a definitive diagnosis and cure can often be grueling, invasive, and expensive. On the other hand, pets undergoing palliative treatment can spend their last days in comfort, surrounded by the things and people they love.
Thoughtful consultation with your veterinarian can help you arrive at an appropriate decision about continued diagnostics, hospitalization when necessary, as well as when the toll, both physical and emotional, of those things may be more than is reasonable to bear and it becomes time to move to comfort care as a primary plan.
While, unfortunately, no treatment can eliminate the emotional difficulty of having a pet moving into its last stages of life, palliative care’s goal is to allow you time to make peace with the reality of the approaching end of your pet’s life while hopefully also granting both of you some valuable quality time together.
You can enjoy the benefit of good days spent with your pet and the comforting knowledge that you have done your best to make a beloved friend’s end as happy and stress-free as possible.
Before embarking on a palliative care plan with your pet, we need to look at the big picture. Caregiving for a pet with special needs is not easy and can mean significant changes to a household. The primary consideration should be your pet’s quality of life. Will palliative care be able to keep them comfortable or only prolong their discomfort?
It is also essential to consider your emotional well-being. Watching a beloved pet decline slowly can be difficult. Providing palliative care takes a significant amount of time and energy. It can also mean taking on a considerable financial burden, depending on the course of treatment.
At Ballantyne Vet, we will discuss plans thoroughly with you to decide if palliative care is the right choice for your furry friend. We will both need to approach the situation with an open heart and mind as to what is realistically possible, both from the standpoint of expectation of your pet’s medical condition, as well as what is realistic as far as care that can be done at home.
This is an important time for all of us on the care team, from doctors to caregivers, to be realistic as to what can be accomplished.
Never hesitate to ask questions. Palliative pet care is complex and emotionally challenging, and we understand if you feel confused or overwhelmed. It may be helpful to prepare some questions in advance, like:
The primary goal of palliative pet care is always to keep the pet comfortable, and the evaluation of the pet’s condition is a daily task that needs to be carried out at home. As time passes, the initial treatment plan may need to be adjusted based on your observations.
Caregiving can be grueling, and there is no way to ease the grief that comes with pet loss entirely. But there are some things you can do to make pet end-of-life care easier, including:
While undeniably difficult, providing palliative care for pets is critical to pet ownership. Whatever you choose, the team at Ballantyne Vet will help you make the right plan for you and your pet. Options like at-home euthanasia can help make a difficult situation less distressing for both pet and owner, making those final moments gentler.
No one likes to experience the inevitable decline brought on by disease and age, but pets rely on their owners to make responsible, compassionate choices when these changes begin to occur. The comfort and pain management provided by palliative care is one option for handling a beloved companion’s end-of-life needs.
By being proactive and talking to an expert in advance, pet owners can make a difficult situation less stressful for themselves and their pets. If you live in the South Charlotte area and are seeing signs that suggest it’s time to consider palliative care, contact Ballantyne Veterinary Clinic to schedule an appointment with our team of compassionate experts.
Whether you need palliative care support, in-office or at-home euthanasia services, or even cremation services through our partners at Faithful Companions, the team at Ballantyne Vet is here for you.