Palliative care course in Geriatrics inaugurated at Yenepoya Medical College

Mangaluru: "Palliative Care or Shamaka Aairaike for our elderly Has become so important today with the advent of nuclear families, that we have planned to have a 30-bed palliative care ward at Wenlock Hospital,” declared Dr Ramakrishna Rao, district health officer, inaugurating the palliative care certificate course in Geriatrics at Yenepoya Medical College, organized by Dr Prabha Adhikari, head of Internal Medicine. The course director is Dr Jochen Becker, MD, MediAcion, Germany.

Dr Sudhakar Nayak, an accomplished palliative care expert conducted the inaugural session to an enthusiastic batch of medical students.

The course enlightens to empathize with the patients, their family and interact in a mutually comfortable manner. Breaking bad news, end of life care and other efforts to make the patient and their families comfortable.

Dr.Jochen Becker conducted the course using the effective Psycho Drama Technique where breaking bad news is made comfortable to both the doctor and the patients.

Dr Prabha Adhikari, Dr Gayathri Bhat, and Dr Anant Rao conducted various other aspects of the course.

The palliative care course was formally inaugurated by lighting the lamp. Dr Ramakrishna Rao, DHO, along with Dr Sudhakar Nayak, Dr Kishore Kumar Ubrangala, Dr Santosh Yatnati, Dr Prabha Adhikari and Jerardin D'Souza, founder of Mangalore Alzheimer's Association MAA. Student representatives too joined in.