1.1 Why are we here?

Before we start, let’s think about reasons for studying this course about Parkinson’s palliative and end of life care. You might have decided to take this course for one or more of these reasons:

  • You are working as part of the specialist team to support a number of people with Parkinson’s.
  • You feel you could do a better job if you understood palliative and end of life care.
  • Your expertise is in palliative and end of life care, but you have limited experience of Parkinson’s.
  • Your manager told you to take this course.
  • You want to increase your knowledge around Parkinson’s to learn more about specific topics.

As much as possible we have designed the course to support those different contexts. Please remember it is your responsibility to determine whether specific recommendations are relevant to your role, as many are aimed at the specialist team.

We have created a reflection log for you to record your thoughts when answering questions throughout the course. Remember there are no wrong answers here.

Reflective exercise

Use your reflection log [Tip: hold Ctrl and click a link to open it in a new tab. (Hide tip)]   to answer the following questions:

  1. Why did I decide to take part in this course and what would I like to gain from it?
  2. What experience do I have in palliative and end of life care? (A short paragraph will suffice.)
  3. What experience do I have in the management and support of a person with Parkinson’s at the end of life stage?
  4. How did I find this experience? For example, did I find it challenging, or did my present experience allow me to manage my client with confidence and satisfaction?

You can use your log at the end of the course to reflect on the knowledge you have gained and how you can use this in the future to enhance your practice.

1 Introduction

2 Palliative and end of life care in Parkinson’s