Palliative and Hospice Medicine Diagnosis and Treatment Essentials: A Clinical Guide to Symptom Control, Comfort Care, and End-of-Life Management (The Clinical Essentials Series)

Clinicians providing palliative and hospice care face a persistent gap: the references available to them are either encyclopedic multi-volume texts too large for daily use, or pocket handbooks too thin to explain the reasoning behind clinical decisions.

Palliative and Hospice Medicine Diagnosis and Treatment Essentials fills that gap. Written for the clinicians who actually deliver care at the bedside, this 2026 clinical guide covers symptom control, comfort care, and end-of-life management with the depth of a comprehensive textbook and the focus of a practical reference. Every chapter teaches the pathophysiology behind the symptom, the evidence behind the intervention, and the clinical judgment that connects the two.

This volume provides dedicated, disease-specific palliative care chapters for advanced heart failure, COPD, end-stage liver and renal disease, dementia, stroke, and progressive neurological conditions alongside thorough coverage of cancer-related palliative care. Four chapters address pain management from opioid pharmacology and equianalgesic conversion through adjuvant therapies and interventional approaches. Communication skills, ethical frameworks including medical aid in dying and palliative sedation, and hospice-specific clinical guidance receive the same depth as pharmacology.

Comprehensive pain management across four dedicated chapters: opioid pharmacology, equianalgesia and rotation protocols, non-opioid adjuvants, and interventional techniques Non-pain symptom management for dyspnea, delirium, nausea, cachexia, agitation, insomnia, wound care, and refractory symptoms Disease-specific palliative care with prognostication, hospice eligibility criteria, and symptom trajectories for each major organ-failure pathway Goals-of-care communication frameworks, family conference structure, and strategies for navigating conflict and prognostic uncertainty Hospice medicine operations: Medicare benefit structure, eligibility certification, recertification, formulary management, and IDT practice More than 100 clinical procedure and teaching videos accessible through integrated QR codes throughout the text Clinical images and illustrations supporting visual learning across all major topics Pediatric and perinatal palliative care, ethical and legal frameworks, psychosocial assessment, spiritual care, and clinician resilience Clinical pearls, case vignettes, comparison tables, and reference appendices including opioid conversion tables, prognostic scoring tools, and hospice eligibility criteria by diagnosis Written for hospice and palliative medicine fellows, early-career HPM physicians, nurse practitioners, physician assistants, hospitalists, and palliative care nurses seeking a current, clinically rigorous, and practically organized reference for daily practice.

Start building your clinical library with the guide designed for the way you actually practice.