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Caring for People with Diabetes at the End of Life

  • Health Care Delivery Systems and Implementation in Diabetes (EB Morton-Eggleston and ME McDonnell, Section Editors)
  • Published:
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Abstract

End-of-life care planning is assuming global significance. While general end-of-life care guidelines apply to diabetes, there are some diabetes-specific issues that need to be considered. These include the usual long trajectory to end-of-life care that enables clinicians and people with diabetes to proactively discuss when to change the focus of care from preventing diabetes complications (tight control) to a palliative approach. Palliative care aims to promote comfort and quality of life and reduce the unnecessary burden of care on individuals and their families. The aim of this paper is to discuss common disease trajectories and their relationship to diabetes care, outline strategies for proactively discussing these issues and suggest indications that palliative care is warranted.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Deakin University and Barwon Health, Kitchener House, C/- The Geelong Hospital, Ryrie Street, PO Box 281, Geelong, Vic, 3220, Australia

    Trisha Dunning, Nicole Duggan & Sally Savage

Authors
  1. Trisha Dunning
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  2. Nicole Duggan
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  3. Sally Savage
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Correspondence to Trisha Dunning.

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Trisha Dunning, Nicole Duggan and Sally Savage declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human or animal subjects performed by any of the authors.

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This article is part of the Topical Collection on Health Care Delivery Systems and Implementation in Diabetes

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Dunning, T., Duggan, N. & Savage, S. Caring for People with Diabetes at the End of Life. Curr Diab Rep 16, 103 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11892-016-0801-z

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