Hospice and Home Care: How Home Care Can Enhance the Hospice Experience

When hospice care and personal home care work together, the patient and their family can be assured they are receiving the highest level of support possible.

What is Hospice?

Hospice is a level of care designed to comfort patients through the final stages of life. To qualify for hospice one is required to have a physicians orders and a certification of terminal illness stating that you have an outlook of roughly 6 months. Choosing hospice is always a difficult decision as it requires the patient and family members to accept the prognosis of the illness and come to terms with the fact that their loved one is in the final stages of their life.

What does hospice cover?

Hospice covers:

• Medication

• Any necessary medical equipment such as:

  • Hospital bed

  • Walker or wheelchair

  • Commode chair

• Any necessary medical supplies such as:

  • Briefs or chucks

  • Sanitizing wipes

• Social services

  • Aid family and patient

• Chaplin services

  • Council with patient and family

• Nurse visits as needed to perform medical duties such as:

  • Dose and administer medication

• Aid visits as needed to perform personal care assistance, elimination assistance, and provision of safety.

Necessary medical equipment, medical equipment, medication, and frequency of nurse and aid visits will be determined during patient intake and incorporated into the patients care plan. The patient's care plan is frequently updated as the patients condition changes. For example, the patient may begin with weekly visits but as their needs change closer to the end of live, aides and nurses visit more frequently and even daily.

What is Home Care?

Total In Home Services is a personal care agency that assists seniors, expecting/new moms, or following a rehab stay wherever they call home. Our goal, and the goal of any home care agency, is to make clients lives easier. Whether we are helping a recently discharged rehab patient adjust back to their home by helping to make their routine more accessible, or taking a senior citizen grocery shopping and helping them meal prep healthy dinners for the week; independence is our priority.

What does home care cover?

Home care aides can perform a wide variety of duties that hospice aides can also perform:

• Assistance with personal care including:

  • Bathing

  • Oral hygiene

  • Hair care

  • Hand and foot care

  • Application of cosmetics

• Nutrition assistance including:

  • Meal planning

  • Meal preparation and clean up

• Assistance with elimination including:

  • Assistance with bed pan or bedside commode or to the toilet

  • Incontinent or involuntary care

  • Emptying urine collection and colostomy bags

• Provision of safety:

  • Identify and eliminate safety hazards

  • Light housekeeping tasks to maintain home safety

  • Waste disposal

  • Medication reminders

  • Transporting client to run errands or attend community events

How can they work together?

Hospice can be used in combination with home care to ensure the patients support. Though both systems offer aides to perform personal care assistance and other related tasks, when they are working in tandem they can ensure that the patient and their family are completely supported.

Hospice care is typically covered by insurance, which means that the frequency of aid visits must be deemed medically necessary. Home care is not a medical service, though it can be covered by some insurances such as the Medicaid waiver, and long term care insurance. If their insurance does not cover home care, many people choose private pay. Because home care is not a medical service, the frequency of visits is typically up to the client or client's loved ones to decide. This differs from hospice aid services as the frequency of their visits are determined by the medical team when their care plan is constructed. Hospice care plans are revised by the patients nurse with every visit to ensure that the patients needs are met. Home care aid visits can be scheduled by the client or their loved ones to supplement and support the hospice team's efforts. Home care can be especially helpful for hospice patients who do not have a large support system or are in need of 24/7 care.

If you or someone you love is interested in home care as a supplement to hospice care, please call Total at 219-937-2811.