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Astria Health Hospice staff and volunteers are dedicated to providing loving care and support to families and patients with life-limiting illnesses. Our hospice team offers comfort care, pain and symptom relief, and emotional and spiritual support. Families of hospice patients are provided with arrangements for respite care and bereavement services. Our staff has been caring for families for more than 25 years. Hospice is a service that is completely covered by Medicare, Medicaid and most private insurance providers.
Our multidisciplinary team provides medical care, education and emotional support through services such as:
The goal of hospice care is to enhance patients' quality of life through compassionate, respectful care and to:
The hospice benefit is intended primarily for any individual with a terminal illness whose life expectancy is six months or less, should the illness run its usual course. However, the Medicare program recognizes that not all terminal illnesses have a predictable course; therefore, the benefit is available for extended periods of time beyond six months.
Not exactly. Even within the same community, hospice may vary in the quality of care provided. Ask questions and seek the advice of friends or healthcare providers you trust to help you choose the hospice agency that is right for you.
While the Medicare hospice benefit (MHB) requires beneficiaries to forgo curative treatments, some hospices will assist in placing patients into a palliative home health program until the patient is ready for hospice.
Quite the contrary. Hospice and hospice care workers help patients to focus on what they hope and wish for in terms of comfort and quality of life. Along with their family members, a hospice patient has a lead role in their plan of care and their level of comfort. Hospice neither hastens nor prevents death. As studies have shown, hospice patients live 29 days longer on average than those without the benefit of hospice care.
Hospice care is designed to provide not only medical care but also social, psychological and spiritual support delivered by an interdisciplinary team that includes a nurse, social worker, spiritual counselor and other professionals. While pain medications can be a part of a patient's overall plan of care, many other forms of pain and stress relief are included, such as music and even pet therapy.
Hospice care is available "on call" after the administrative offices have closed, 7 days a week, 24 hours a day. However, a hospice worker will not be with you 24/7 unless you are in crisis, and care will then be provided until your condition is stabilized.
Hospice services can be provided to the terminally ill patient wherever they live. This means a patient living in a nursing facility or long-term care facility can receive specialized visits from hospice staff. The hospice and the nursing home will have a written agreement in place in order for hospice to serve residents of the facility.
Most physicians know about hospice. However, if your physician does not, or would like to receive more information about the program, it is available by calling our hospice agency, the National Hospice Palliative Care Association at 800.658.8898, and/or the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services Hospice Center.
Yes. You may keep your personal physician or provider while under the care of hospice. Hospice reinforces the primary care physician/patient relationship and considers the bond to be a high priority.
Yes. If a patient's condition improves or the disease goes into remission, the patient can be discharged from hospice and returned to regular medical treatment such as home health. Likewise, should the patient ever need to return to hospice in the future, these services can be resumed at the patient's request.
No, it is available for anyone who has a terminal or life-limiting diagnosis with a life expectancy of six months or less if the disease runs its normal course.
In general, hospice costs less than hospital or nursing home care. Medicare and many other private insurance plans cover the costs of hospice services. Also, the cost of medications related to the hospice diagnosis is covered by the hospice benefit at no charge to the patient.
