Jeanna Kinnebrew

Alive Hospice is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization that accepts charitable donations from the community. Many people probably have seen obituaries asking for donations to be made to Alive Hospice in lieu of flowers, or noticed an article in our Connection newsletter thanking our Evergreen Society and Friends for Life Society members. Quite a few area businesses sponsor Alive Hospice events and many more offer in-kind donations such as snacks for our summer children’s grief camps.

However, many people may not know exactly why we ask for charitable donations. After all, some might ask, don’t we charge for our services? The answer may be surprising: although Medicare requires hospices to offer bereavement and grief support services, they do not provide reimbursement for those services. So, Alive Hospice’s grief support offerings are almost entirely supported by donations.

Alive Hospice’s mission to provide care to all doesn’t stop with bereavement services. In keeping with our mission, we also provide free care to patients in need of hospice.

Here are just a few of the services community donations allow us to provide:

• More than $1.1 million in charity care to uninsured or underinsured patients in 2009. We believe no one should die alone or in pain, no matter their age or ability to pay.
• Individual counseling sessions, support groups, and grief seminars for anyone experiencing a loss. Our 8 counselors see approximately 4 to 6 people per day for individual sessions. Last year, nearly 500 people attended a support group or a holiday grief seminar. Services are offered free to loved ones of Alive Hospice patients, and services are available on a sliding fee scale for anyone in the community who needs assistance.
• Camp Evergreen and Camp Forget-Me-Not, our 3-day grief support camps for children 6-14. In 2009, nearly 100 children attended these camps, held in Nashville and Murfreesboro.

I invite you to explore our website and learn more about what the community makes possible through charitable giving. If you would like to add your name to the growing list of Tennesseans who support Alive Hospice, visit the Donations link on our main page to make a gift or participate in one of our upcoming events, such as our upcoming memorial butterfly releases. The generosity of people like you is what keeps our work Alive!

Jeanna Kinnebrew is Alive Hospice’s annual fund manager and part of the agency’s Community Development team

This Wednesday, March 31, the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization is encouraging all Americans to wear a white ribbon to promote advance care planning. Alive Hospice is joining in this important effort and urges Middle Tennesseans to consider their wishes for treatment options in advance of a serious illness.

Completing advance directives – advance care plan forms and appointment of health-care agent forms – helps individuals document their wishes for care in writing, should they be rendered unable to make decisions due to an illness. They also provide the option of appointing a trusted loved one to make medical decisions on one’s behalf, if desired.

March 31 marks five years since the death of Terri Schiavo, who was at the center of a very public legal battle between her husband and parents. A debilitating medical emergency rendered Ms. Schiavo unable to make decisions about her care, leaving her family to decide whether to continue or terminate life-sustaining treatments. It’s a reminder of how important it is to consider one’s wishes and write them down, whatever they might be, so that loved ones aren’t faced with the same kind of nightmare scenario.

It’s also a good time to explore options for care at the end of life, including hospice. Though a person may not be in need of end-of-life care today, it never hurts to know one’s options for later in life. Additionally, being well-informed about available options can empower individuals as resources for loved ones who may be facing serious illnesses.

For Tennesseans, more information about advance directives can be accessed by clicking on the “Advance Directives” link at the top of this page. Tools including advance care plan forms and appointment of health-care agent forms are available for download and printing. For those in other states, valuable information can be found at the Caring Connections Web site. Alive Hospice is available as a resource on advance care planning and may be contacted at 327-1085.

We hope American adults will take the time to think about their wishes and urge friends and family to do the same!

Herby, Sam, and Jackson Clark are pictured in a family photo that will always be cherished.

Jackson Clark couldn’t wait to have a baby brother, and when twins Sam and Sadie Clark were born, he couldn’t have been more excited. He had the new brother he had yearned for, and just as special, a new baby sister.

The bond of two brothers knows no age, and Jackson didn’t waste a moment of being a big brother.

“I liked to read books to him. He never really cared which one,” 6-year-old Jackson said with a grin. “He just liked me to read to him.”

He had a lot to teach his brother, forts to build, adventures to share. But only months after Sam was born, Jackson’s mom and dad were confronted with four words every parent fears: Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS). October, Jackson said, is a hard month for his family.

It was hard, said Jackson’s father, Herby Clark. He and Jackson’s mother, Tatum, were suddenly playing the dual roles of parents grieving the loss of a child and being the parents of grieving children. When they heard about Alive Grief Support Services and its children’s program, Mrs. Clark made a call. They learned that Alive Grief Support Services offers individual counseling for children, grief support groups and summer day camps. Jackson has participated in all three, and Mr. Clark has noticed a big difference in his son.

“There’s no doubt about it. We’ve been blown away with how much more open he is and how much more willing he is to talk about it,” Mr. Clark said. He added that Jackson has “a place where he can come and talk, somebody who’s trained and knows what to say …. It’s an amazing thing.”

The children’s grief support group and Camp Evergreen helped Jackson by connecting him with other children who had faced losses just like he had, Mr. Clark said. Individual counseling also helped Jackson find ways to better understand and express the emotions he was feeling, and he learned that he didn’t have to keep his feelings inside to protect his parents, Mr. Clark said.

And though Jackson won’t see his brother take his first steps or hit his first homerun, there’s one thing he has learned that will never change: once a big brother, always a big brother.

This story originally appeared in Alive Hospice’s Connection newsletter.

What would the world be like without social workers? It’s difficult to imagine, given the many ways they contribute to the welfare of our society. National Social Work Month was established in 1984 as a way to say thank you for all the good that social workers do.

In the world of hospice care, social workers play a vital role. Just as hospice physicians and nurses provide comfort for patients’ physical symptoms, social workers look after their emotional well-being. They help patients and their families cope with the devastating news of a terminal illness and bolster them along the way through counseling, ongoing needs assessment, and planning assistance. After a loss, they help grieving adults and children take those first steps toward putting their lives back together.

Alive Hospice is fortunate to have many social workers who serve not only adults, but children, too. Often, they provide support for adult patients and their children. Sometimes, the patient is a child with brothers and sisters who need support just as much as the patient and parents. Alive Hospice has a team of caregivers dedicated to pediatric care, and the social worker is a crucial part of that team.

Tisha Longo, a former preschool teacher, is Alive Hospice’s pediatric social worker. (And the winner of the Mid Cumberland Council of Health Care Social Workers’ 2009 Social Worker of the Year Award!) In her words:

“I feel incredibly blessed to be able to do the work I do. We don’t just take care of the sick child, we take care of everyone who loves that child. I help arrange everything from photos and memory items made, to funeral planning and connecting them to our grief support services. This is the beauty of what Alive Hospice can offer. We walk with the families and follow their direction to best honor their wishes during this most vulnerable time.

“With all our pediatric patients we not only witness sadness, but there is also joy and even laughter. It is hard for people who don’t do this work to understand, but I truly feel that as hospice workers we get the gift of serving our patients and families. I am grateful to be present for a small part of their life’s journey.”

Janny Adkins

Historically there has been a strong connection between hospice care and churches. In other parts of our country, churches originally were the driving impetus to initiate hospice care. The mission of most hospices and faith groups find shared mandates and common ground. Both desire to minister to the needs of people who are in need of compassionate loving care, throughout life and especially during death and a life-threatening illness.

For this reason alone, many faith communities support hospice care through providing volunteers, financial support, and utilizing hospice programs to educate their members. Popular topics for educational programs for faith groups focus on coping with grief, end-of-life care, death and dying, and using hospice care.

Hospice care includes meeting the spiritual needs of the patient and family. Many people confuse spiritual needs with religious needs. They are similar but not synonyms. Most religions have prescribed doctrine for meeting spiritual needs. However, all people, regardless of religious beliefs, are spiritual and have common spiritual needs; how they meet those needs may vary from person to person.

Basic spiritual needs include:

• The need to give and receive love
• The need to give and receive forgiveness
• The need to find meaning and purpose in life
• The need to have a sense of connection to others, self, to nature, and to something bigger than the self.

If you or your church are interested in more information regarding Alive Hospice, or would like a speaker on topics related to hospice care, please call me at 615-332-4003 or e-mail me.
 
Janny Adkins is an Alive Hospice account executive who informs health care professionals, patients, and families about hospice care.

Alive Hospice holds memorial services every other month for Middle Tennesseans who are in mourning. At last night’s service, participants received pins in recognition of the courage it takes to carry on. They also serve as reminders of the support that’s available through Alive Grief Support Services.

We do this in remembrance of those who have left us, and to bring comfort to those who remain.

Ruth Williams

Recently, we’ve gotten a hint of spring. Glorious, isn’t it? When we see and feel the sun after it’s been absent for many days, it’s so energizing. Folks fill the parks and roads, anxious to be out and about after being isolated during the cold and often snowy days we’ve experienced.

One of the distinctions between grief and clinical depression is the ability to have a “sunshiny day.” A grieving person may have many, many days of sadness, one right after the other. And yet, almost in a surprising way, that same person might awaken to discover the sun is indeed shining, That glimmer of hope – as brief as it may be – is like the hint of spring. Spring will come again. We will live to see another day to breathe in the warm air and soak in the sun’s rays.

Just like this particular winter was like no other, life will never be the same after the loss of a loved one. And yet, just as much as we can count on the sun rising and the seasons changing, life will, at some point, become livable again. And those who grieve will once again notice the sun – and smile.

Ruth Williams is a counselor with Alive Grief Support Services, the bereavement support program of Alive Hospice.

Registration for Alive Hospice’s spring grief support groups is under way. These eight-week support groups will begin meeting later this month in Nashville and Murfreesboro. Groups for adults and children are offered.

Pre-registration is required, and the deadline is March 15. Click here for more information.

In the words of one past participant: “It put us on the road to recovery. Our leaders were very compassionate. They understood where we were. I had such great blesssings out of Alive Hospice.”

And another: “You could tell the healing process was taking place. You take one day a at a time, one step at a time.”