On 24 August 2021, ICMR Bioethics Unit, ICMR-NCDIR, Bengaluru organised a Public Webinar on Ethics, Compassion, Dignity in End-of-Life Care & Death.
The webinar was held as part of ICMR’s celebrations to mark India’s 75th Independence Day and to share their initiative towards End-of-life care. The panellists comprised of distinguished people such as:
- Dr Varsha Muthuswamy - Chairperson, ICMR-CECHR, former Sr. DDG, ICMR, Mumbai
- Dr Sushma Bhatnagar - Professor and Head, Palliative Medicine, IRCH AIIMS, New Delhi
- Ms Harmala Gupta - Founder-President, CanSupport, New Delhi
- Dr M R Rajagopal, Chairman, Pallium India, Trivandrum
- Dr Raj Kumar Mani - Director, Clinical Services, Pulmonology & Critical Care, Yashoda Hospital, Ghaziabad
- Dr Roli Mathur - Scientist F and Head, ICMR Bioethics Unit, ICMR - NCDIR, Bengaluru
The webinar was aimed at creating a better understanding about:
- Providing home based care for those who are terminally ill;
- Ethical challenges in utilizing technology to prolong life of the people suffering on their death bed;
- Caregiver’s role to ensure a dignified death;
- ICMR’s initiative on End-of-life care.
Speaking at the webinar, CanSupport Founder-President Harmala Gupta highlighted the need for the medical fraternity to treat a patient as a human being. She added that the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has been a blessing because the entire world has come to realise the importance of human contact. She said, therefore the work that CanSupport does through its home-based palliative care teams is so significant because our teams enter the homes of the patients in our care as one human being meeting another human being.
A dying person needs empathetic people and the language of feelings, not medical terms and technical language. In the final weeks, final hours, it’s important to reinforce to the dying person that they are not alone, and will not be left alone. That there are people to provide them comfort and pain relief and to watch over them. And by doing that, one is performing the greatest service.
Harmala Gupta again emphasised that a patient is not their kidney or liver or tumour, but a human being. That’s why home-based palliative care is marvellous because the patient at the end of life is in familiar surroundings, in a place that houses their memories, with their loved ones to take one final look at that mandala (their life) before it disintegrates.
To watch the entire webinar, click here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rSLiKUEIHl8