Filed under: hospital, hospital social work, learning curve, Uncategorized | Tags: hospice
There is a person I and my colleagues work with on a fairly regular basis. The one thing I have to say about her is that she is very thorough and conscientious and truly wants the best for patients once they leave our facility. The problem comes when she can’t seem to come up with what she considers to be an adequate plan.
So, what is her fall back options for these people?? You guessed already? She thinks that a hospice referral would be just the ticket? How did you know??Oh yeah…the title of my post probably gave it away.
So, at least a handful of times a month she’ll give us a call and say, “Well, so-in-so could really use some help at home. They are 94 (or 82 or 77 or 55) and I’m going to be sending you guys a hospice referral.” We’ll also get this call if the family doesn’t think they can pay for things like a hospital bed or a commode.
So, we’ll say, “Well, only a doctor can write a hospice order and, by the way, what’s the hospice qualifying diagnosis?” Sometimes the hospice qualifying is the fact that the person is rather aged. Recently it was that they were blind and aged.
The thing is that hospice IS a wonderful resource for people and their families. Hospice provides care for people in the last part of their lives. They provide the family with necessary medical equipment such as hospital beds and medicines needed to make their loved ones comfortable in their last days. They receive nursing care and other supports. They get visits from social workers and chaplains. I feel that hospice care is some of the best medical care provided here in the US and around the world.
But, the thing is, hospice can’t provide round the clock, hands on care. And they can’t provide care to people who are expected to live longer than 6 months. And some times, people aren’t ready for hospice care even if they aren’t expected to live longer than 6 months.
So, we’re still trying to explain to her that hospice isn’t for everyone…
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Agreed. Indeed, an interesting option to fall back on!
Comment by Anatolia May 26, 2010 @ 10:53 pm