What Is Hospice?

Hospice care is a specialized field of medicine that focuses on quality of life and comfort for patients once they receive a diagnosis of a terminal illness. Patients and their loved ones are cared for by an entire team with the goal of maximizing quality of life.

The hospice care team consists of a nurse, doctor, certified nursing assistant, social worker, chaplain, grief counselors, and volunteers. They are all experts in end-of-life care and know how to make patients as comfortable as possible.

Your social worker can help connect you to all kinds of community resources.
Our chaplains respect the way you experience your illness and will support you however you find meaning at this time.
Our grief counselors support all members of the community who have experienced a loss, even if they have not had a loved one in our care.
Our volunteers are available upon request to provide everything from companionship to therapeutic music and personal services like haircutting and gentle massage.

What does the hospice admission process involve?

One of the first things we will do is contact the patient’s physician to make sure he or she agrees that hospice care is appropriate for this patient at this time. Alive has medical staff available to help patients who have no physician. In fact, Alive is one of the few hospices to have its own on-staff doctors and a pharmacist.

When the admission process begins, the patient will sign consent and insurance forms, similar to when someone enters a hospital. The hospice election form says that the patient understands that the care is palliative (meaning that it is aimed at pain relief and symptom control) rather than curative. It also outlines the services available. The form Medicare patients sign also tells how electing the Medicare hospice benefit affects other Medicare coverage.

Do you want to learn more about our admission process?