Some graduate students enrolled in the University of Pittsburgh School of Social Work are working on a project that addresses the misconceptions of hospice care. They are concerned that too many people view a hospice referral as a death sentence. I recommend the article, and getting a copy of the report after the students present…
Category Archives: Hospice Agency Operations
Leave a good wake
There are many ways to serve our community. One fulfilling avenue is through hospice volunteering. What does a hospice volunteer do? preparing simple meals reading to the patient helping write letters listening/emotional support doing simple household tasks relieving the caregiver for short periods Most volunteers visit their families once or twice a week and will…
Hospice in Nairobi
I am in Nairobi, Kenya this week working in prisons with Prison Fellowship Kenya (www.pfm.org). While here, I met a man who has some experience with Kenyan hospice, and a young lady who told me a story about a her friend. There is only one hospice in Nairobi, a town of 3.5 million people. Most…
Hospice Blogs
Here is a list of the top 50 hospice blogs. I like the list because it breaks out the blogs into categories, such as hospice law, and caregiving. I do note that they don’t have a category for spirituality, which is the focus of the Fort Worth Texas Hospice blog. For those of you who…
Non-hospice diagnosis
Often, one of the Texas Hospice patients suffers a “non-hospice diagnosis,” which is an injury or disease that is not related to their reason for coming onto our hospice service. An example, which occurred to one of our patients this past week, is when a patient suffering from end-stage dementia breaks a hip. They may…
Graduating from hospice
A small percentage of Texas Hospice patients do not follow the normal, expected course of decline toward death. Instead, they return to good health after receiving our care. These are our graduates. A good example was a patient of ours who suffered from dementia. After receiving daily hospice aid visits, music therapy, a cleaner bed…
Health Care Reform: Mixing Medicine and Business
There is a tension between medicine and business: business demands cost efficiency, while medicine requires excellence at any cost. Now that healthcare is receiving a legislative overhaul, we are introducing a third player in the game, the government. Most of us vote for whatever legislation benefits us personally. That is why the hospital and insurance…
Frequent Falling
What should you do if an aging or ailing loved one is falling frequently? This issue arises often in hospice care, particularly for home-bound patients. We always investigate the cause of falling: Low blood pressure can make people light-headed. It can result from dehydration (not eating enough, or vomitting/diarrhea), taking too much blood pressure medicine,…
Kudos, an old Greek word, used in Texas
I was present at a patient’s house this past week at the moment she passed. We were able to console family and set in motion mortuary and other services. Our team handled themselves well. Before the patient passed I visited with some family members. They mentioned that our social worker called a court justice in…
Common questions happen commonly
Many of our patients hear about us through our website. Sometimes the patient’s children call and ask us pertinent questions about hospice in general, and what makes us unique as a Fort Worth hospice. Yesterday, I fielded some excellent questions from someone whose parent is considering our service. Here are some excerpts: Question: Can someone…
