Triggering and Increasing Palliative Care Consults in the Emergency Room

Dr. Caroline Tigere’s book discusses increasing palliative care consultation in the Emergency Room by educating healthcare providers to identifiying patients who are eligible for early palliative care encounters. Dr. Tigere, a palliative care Nurse Practitioner, has worked tirelessly to increase palliative care consults from the Emergency Room before this project. The number of consultations originiating from the Emergency Room increased after an evidenced-based tool was used to assist the Emergency room providers in identifying appropriate patients.

Several palliative care providers have tried to move palliative care upstream to the Emergency Room without success because there is still belief that every patient who comes to the Emergency Room should receive aggressive care.

About the Author

Dr. Caroline Tigere is married and blessed with three children. Her career started off as a registered nurse to being a nurse practitioner focusin gmainly in hospice and palliative care. She attained her Doctoral in Nursing Practice and focused on Palliative Care in acute care hospitals.

She works for a community hospice as a hospice nurse practitioner, and she also works as a palliative care nurse practitioner in acute care, embracing disclosing terminal diagnoses in palliative care and then getting the opportunity to support the patients through the disease trajectory in hospice.

Caroline enjoys spending time with family and travelling. She likes water activities and outdoors and also gardening. She is married with three children, and her husband is also in healthcare and pursuing an advanced degree in theology.