{{ item.categories[0] }}
I came here to learn about palliative care
“I came here to learn more about palliative care for my GP work. What surprised me is how much I’ve fallen in love with it.”
When Dr Anita Banerjee joined ellenor earlier this year to provide maternity cover on the medical team, she expected simply to deepen her understanding of palliative care for her work as a GP. What she discovered instead was a deeply rewarding field of medicine and a team whose expertise helps patients and families feel safe at some of the most vulnerable moments of their lives.
A portfolio GP with more than twenty years’ experience across NHS and private practice, Anita joined the medical team at ellenor as a Specialty Grade doctor, bringing with her a wide-ranging career that also includes medical appraisal work and executive coaching.
But during her time at the hospice, she found herself drawn into a specialty she hadn’t originally planned to pursue.
On the hospice’s inpatient ward, Anita supports patients with life-limiting conditions, managing complex symptoms and helping families through one of the most difficult moments of their lives.
“I’m probably quite unusual as a doctor,” she says. “I love English literature, I love reading and writing, and I’ve always been drawn to creative things as well as medicine.”
Alongside her clinical work, Anita is also a medical appraiser for doctors across London and
the South East and runs her own executive life coaching business. Her decision to spend time working in hospice care was, at first, simply curiosity.
But something unexpected happened.
“I came in to increase my knowledge and help my general practice patients,” Anita says. “But I didn’t expect to actually want to stay.”
“When I was at medical school, I don’t remember receiving any training in palliative care at all,” she explains. “It’s quite a new specialty compared with others. When you’re a young doctor you tend to think about the big areas of medicine – surgery, cardiology, things like that. Hospice medicine just wasn’t really on the radar.”
Her plan was simple: spend time learning about palliative care so she could better support patients in her general practice work.
“I thought it would be a really good opportunity to understand the specialty more and take that knowledge back into general practice.”
But working at ellenor quickly changed her perspective.
“What really surprised me is how much I’ve loved being here,” she says. “It’s such a lovely team. I honestly can’t believe how kind everyone is.”
Hospice medicine, she explains, is often misunderstood.
Patients admitted to the inpatient ward often have complex medical needs and require careful management of symptoms such as pain, breathlessness or nausea.
“The medications and treatments used in palliative care can be very different from what you’d normally use in general practice,” she explains. “Even if you’re a very experienced doctor, it’s still a specialised area of medicine.”
Yet for Anita, the technical aspects of the role are only part of what makes hospice care so distinctive. Communication is just as important.
“You’re almost caring for two patients,” she says. “You’ve got the patient and you’ve got the family.”
Families often arrive after supporting their loved one through a long period of illness, and hospice care can offer a sense of reassurance and stability.
“What really stands out here is how the team help people feel safe,” Anita says.
“When patients come into a hospice, it’s often the most vulnerable moment of their lives. Knowing they feel safe and cared for really matters.”
For families, that reassurance can be incredibly important.
“Sometimes just knowing there’s a doctor there and that their loved one is being seen every day makes people feel safe,” she says. “It means they can step away for a few hours or get some rest knowing that everything possible is being done.”
Working in hospice care has also shown Anita aspects of medicine that are rarely visible to the public. With only a small number of inpatient beds available, doctors must sometimes make difficult decisions about who most urgently needs admission.
“Some days there might only be one bed available and several patients who need it,” she says. “Deciding who comes in can be incredibly difficult.”
Those decisions are made carefully, considering each patient’s symptoms, their circumstances and what support is available elsewhere.
“A huge amount of hospice care actually happens in the community,” Anita explains.
Specialist nurses and doctors support patients in their homes and care homes, often working closely with GPs and hospital teams.
“The community teams do an incredible amount of work,” she says. “They support patients with very complex needs every day.”
Another difference Anita has noticed compared with other areas of medicine is the time available to spend with patients.
“In general practice you might have seven to ten minutes with someone,” she says. “Here you can spend the time that patients and families need.”
That time allows doctors to build trust and continue conversations over several days.
“You’re able to answer questions properly and come back to those conversations the next day,” she says. “It makes a huge difference.”
For Anita, one of the most moving aspects of hospice care has been the response from patients and families.
“The thing that surprised me most is how grateful people are,” she says.
Even in the most difficult circumstances, families often express appreciation for the care their loved ones receive.
“You can feel that the time you’ve spent with them has really mattered.”
Looking back, Anita says hospice medicine has changed how she sees her profession.
“I genuinely wish I had known about this specialty earlier in my career,” she says.
“It’s incredibly important work.”
At the end of each day, that sense of purpose stays with her.
“You leave knowing you’ve done everything you can for that person,” she says. “And that matters.”
Hospice medicine is highly specialised.
• Doctors manage complex pharmacology and symptom control.
• Communication with patients and families is a clinical skill.
• Hospice care involves difficult resource decisions.
• Many clinicians describe the work as deeply rewarding.
“When patients come into a hospice, it’s often the most vulnerable moment of their lives.”
“Knowing they feel safe and cared for really matters” – — Dr Anita Banerjee.
Filter by:
