When a person has advanced cancer and is given morphine to feel better but not to treat the cancer, this is an example of palliative care.
- focusing on relieving the pain or discomfort of an illness, rather than on a cure: palliative nursing care
- excusing; extenuating
- Tending or serving to palliate.
- Alleviating the symptoms of a disease or disorder, especially one that is terminal, when a cure is not available.
(comparative more palliative, superlative most palliative)
- (medicine) Something that palliates, particularly a palliative medicine.
- The radiation and chemotherapy were only palliatives.