Specialized palliative and hospice care and the importance of mourning our Nation's veterans

Abstract

One aspect of palliative medicine that has been underexplored is the perspective of veterans either facing critical life-limiting illness or at the end of life. The needs of veterans differ not only because military culture affects how veterans cope with their illness but also because exposure-related factors (combat and environmental) differ between military branches. In this paper, we describe two cases involving end-of-life care for veterans with combat trauma and describe individualized approaches to their care.