Advice for palliative care volunteers
Offer a “compassionate heart” through “that skill of listening intently; of listening gracefully, not intrusively.” He goes on to say that this “is the ground floor of being a medical professional in palliative care, but especially a volunteer.”
Deep, compassionate listening is transformative for patients at the end of their lives. As they slowly lose autonomy, the work of rehumanizing them becomes essential. This puts palliative care volunteers in a place where they can offer something monumental:
“You are often offered the privilege of listening to their stories, and through that listening, to establish a caring relationship. When you do listen, honestly, caringly, you affirm the inherent value of each individual in all his or her complexity at a point when their life is coming down to that fading point, you have the capacity through the heart of your listening to affirm the ultimate dignity of that person lying in that bed with all those lines coming into them and the sorrow in their in their eyes, and it is an enormous gift to have those moments . . . it is a moment of humanizing.”
Excerpt from: “The Heart of the Matter: Personal reflections on caring and being cared for.” An interview with palliative care volunteer and patient advocate Jim Mulcahy who shares how he became involved in palliative care and how volunteers make a crucial impact.
https://ehospice.com/editorial_posts/i-learn-by-going-where-i-have-to-go/
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