If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Hospice services are available twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. There is always a nurse on call at night and on weekends. The nurse will  check the patient as long and as often as necessary to ensure quality hospice care. Because of this amazing service, many people are under the impression that hospice care is expensive, and might think that they cannot afford such treatment. However Medicare, Medicaid and private insurance companies cover hospice care and services. This would include, but is not limited to, medications, medical supplies, nursing care, home health aides and social services. In 1983, Congress established the Medicare Hospice Benefit, covered under Medicare Part A, to ensure that all beneficiaries could receive high-quality end-of-life assisted care.

For the patient to recieve the Medicare Hospice Benefit, they must fit into three key criteria. First, the patient’s doctor must certify, in his or her best clinical judgment, that the patient is terminally ill with a life expectancy of six months or less. If the patient lives longer than six months, he or she can continue to receive hospice care as long as the doctor re-certifies that the patient is terminal and with declining health. The second key criterion would be the patient to be willing to recieve comfort care rather than curative treatments for their illness. For example, a patient could not be getting chemotherapy to cure their illness and be getting hospice care simultaneously. Hospice is intended be used once curative treatment is no longer an option.

And lastly, the patient needs to enroll in a Medicare-approved hospice program. This should be one of the first questions you ask in determining which hospice agency to use. Take note that one major fear people have of dying is that they’ll be in pain. Hospice eases that fear by providing palliative care with an emphasis on pain control. The main objective is to relieve symptoms that interfere with one;s quality of life. Hospice manages emotional and spiritual pain in addition to physical pain. More than 90% of hospices in the United States are certified by Medicare.