How can you best help someone in their last phase of life? Pulmonologist Sander de Hosson believes that we live in a society in which it has become almost unacceptable that you die from a disease. Together with patient Jannie Oskam, he explains why it is important to make death easier to discuss.
Jannie Oskam, terminally ill, believes that more attention should be paid to palliative care. “I have an illness, but I don’t feel sick. It’s more the treatments. That is a process and that is also an emotional task. It demands a lot from your resilience.”
“I have a good quality of life. But I think the psychological aspect is actually the hardest, and that is also the aspect that actually gets the least attention. It is my mission to make palliative care known, but especially among patients. Because I had to ask for palliative care myself when I was terribly ill. I happened to know it existed because I’ve always worked in healthcare. No one knows that it exists.”
