Hospice provides physical care focused to promote comfort and offer individualized emotional and practical support for those nearing the end of life. It also helps both patient and family make decisions about how to best manage their care. Many of our patients and their family repeatedly note they wish they had known more about hospice and had decided to access care and support earlier. Why hospice? Hospice exists to provide help and support for those faced with an incurable disease for which there is no treatment; or for those who have decided to discontinue treatment that is causing more physical distress than benefit. Hospice can make it possible for patients to remain at home where most prefer to be, and still access skilled physical, emotional, and spiritual, and volunteer support. Hospice considers the entire family the “unit of care.” This means that care is extended to both patient and family; that all are included in decision-making and that all received help in making and maintaining control over choices about end-of-life issues. Hospice office comfort care when a cure is no longer an option or goal. By providing proper pain and symptom control, hospice can enable the patient to live as fully and comfortably as possible. Hospice neither hastens or prolongs death. Hospice affirms life and considers dying a normal process. It focuses on “quality” of life than the length. Who is eligible for hospice? Anyone who has a life-limiting illness or disease (such as cancer; end-stage heart, lung, liver, or kidney disease; ALS; MS; or end-stage dementia such as Alzheimer's Disease) and is no longer seeking aggressive treatment is probably eligible for hospice. Those admitted to hospice have met the required criteria and their physician has certified based upon their medical diagnosis “their life expectancy is six months or less if the illness runs its normal course.” Referral to the program can be made by anyone – the patient, a family member, friend, or physician, with final approval for admission made by the patient’s attending physician. While many times services are limited up to six months, hospice care can be extended (recertified) for a longer period if needed. We offer:
