Multidisciplinary care
Your care team
Serious illness is handled by a team, and most people only ever meet two or three of them. Knowing who does what is the difference between waiting six months and asking the right person on Tuesday.
Doctor / consultant
Diagnosis, treatment plan, prognosis, referrals.
Ask them about: The aim of treatment, options, what to expect, and referral to anyone below.
Specialist nurse
Day-to-day guidance, symptom management, coordination.
Ask them about: Symptoms, side effects, what is urgent, and who to call out of hours.
Psychologist / counsellor
Assessment and talking therapy for patients, caregivers and families.
Ask them about: Anxiety, low mood, adjustment, trauma, fear of dying, family conflict.
Registered dietitian
Individualised nutrition assessment, therapeutic diets and supplements.
Ask them about: Weight change, appetite loss, swallowing, renal or diabetic diets, tube feeding.
Social worker
Benefits, housing, care packages, safeguarding, family support.
Ask them about: Money, care at home, respite, and entitlements you may not know exist.
Physiotherapist
Mobility, strength, breathlessness, falls prevention.
Ask them about: Safe exercise, fatigue pacing, equipment, getting up after a fall.
Occupational therapist
Daily function, home adaptation, energy conservation.
Ask them about: Aids, bathroom and stair safety, returning to work, pacing routines.
Speech and language therapist
Communication and swallowing.
Ask them about: Aphasia, voice, coughing while eating, texture-modified diets.
Pharmacist
Medication review, interactions, timing, side effects.
Ask them about: Simplifying regimens, what to take with food, and supplement interactions.
Palliative care specialist
Symptom control and quality of life at any stage of serious illness.
Ask them about: Pain, breathlessness, nausea, fatigue, advance care planning.
Chaplain / spiritual care
Meaning, faith, doubt, ritual — for people of any faith or none.
Ask them about: Existential distress, ceremonies, and someone to sit with the unanswerable.
Getting more from appointments
- Write your three most important questions down before you go — anxiety erases them in the room.
- Take someone with you. A second pair of ears remembers what you will not.
- Ask them to write down the plan, or ask permission to record the conversation.
- Ask 'what is the aim of this treatment?' — cure, control or comfort. The answer shapes everything else.
- Ask 'what should make us call you, and on which number?'
- Say plainly if you have not understood. Clinicians routinely overestimate how clear they were.
- Ask about referral to psychology, dietetics, social work or palliative care — none of these require you to be at the end of anything.
The one-page summary
Worth an hour of anyone's time
Keep one page at the front of a folder, or as a photo on your phone: diagnoses, current medicines and doses, allergies, key contacts, and the out-of-hours number. In every emergency and every new department, it saves hours — and in a crisis it is often the caregiver's single most useful possession.
Afya Companion offers education and self-help support. It does not diagnose, treat or replace care from your doctor, nurse, psychologist or dietitian. If something in your health changes, speak to your care team.