This is often forgotten: Hospice care Nursing home patients have this option - Freeport, IL - The Journal-Standard

Warren Reuber, 86, of Ridott is a cancer survivor for both prostate and bladder cancer, but when his memory began to slip, his six children needed to act on his behalf and collectively they decided to place their father under the care of Stephenson Nursing Center in Freeport. His children took turns visiting him each day, but they began to have added worry of his increased dementia and began to look for options.

One daughter, Kathy Holste, who is a nurse, learned hospice care was available for nursing home residents, which surprised her, and she looked into options of hospice for his care.

“The main goal for my family is to make sure our father is comfortable and after many trips to the emergency room for him, we all became overwhelmed,” Holste said. “A friend told us about hospice care, so I talked to a hospice nurse at the nursing home and we discovered our father was eligible.”

Holste said her father’s cancer is stable at the moment and added the hospice care he is getting at the nursing center has taken a weight off the shoulders of her and her siblings.

“FHN Hospice monitors and works close with the staff at the nursing center, because they have a plan for his care and this makes it easier for everyone, especially dad,” Holste said.

When a family member is sick, it also places a burden of the family and it is hospice care that acts as a advocate for the family, gives them a reassuring feeling and makes sure the patient care meets the needs of the diagnosis. Hospice care often takes place in the home and allows comfort for the end of days for the patient, but often people are unaware that hospice care is offered to nursing home residents who meet the criteria.

Dixie Beyer is a registered nurse and the hospice operational leader for FHN Hospice in Freeport. To promote nursing home week, is May 10-16, Beyer wants to highlight awareness for hospice nursing home care. She said Medicare recognizes nursing homes as the patient’s home, which enables hospice to offer the care to meet patient’s needs.

Many nursing homes in this area contract with more than one hospice to allow the patient to have a choice, which can come from Freeport, Rockford, Sterling, Chicago and Monroe, Wis. It is the right of the family and the patient to chose their hospice care provider, but Beyer said too often people die in nursing homes without the family knowing their options for care through hospice.
“We send our team to these nursing homes to care for the patient,” Beyer said. “The care is the same at nursing homes as we do in the home.

“We are there to help add a quality of care to the patient and all the family needs to know is they can get a referral from the doctor or a social worker to make the transition from either the home or the hospital to a nursing home facility,” Beyer said.

The needs assessment for a patient are the same for nursing home care as it is for the home. What can hospice care do for the patient in the nursing home? Beyer said families find out the hospice care is more specialized and is supplemental care for the patient.It is also a resource for the family. She also adds often when the patient has immediate needs, it is the hospice caregiver that can get to the patient more quickly.

Hospice in a long-term care facility, like a nursing home or retirement lifestyle campus, is designed to optimize end-of-life services. It is the hospice team who understands the special goals of hospice care and this includes doctors, nurses, social workers, spiritual counselors, home health aides, bereavement counselors and volunteers. This team helps patients live out their final days with dignity and physical comfort.

It is dignity that Susan Perry said helped with the end-of-life care her mother Leona McCullough received at Liberty Village and Manor Court. McCullough died in February from congestive heart failure. She had been under FHN Hospice care while living at Liberty Village and a few weeks before she died, as she became weaker, she was moved to Manor Court. Her patient care team helped with her care.

Perry said the hospice team became a trusted relationship with her mother and she is grateful for their care and support in the final days of her mother’s life.

“It helped to have more people helping her who knew her needs and ours as a family,” Perry said. “None of us will escape death, but I wanted my mother’s time on earth to be safe and comfortable and as good as it could be until the end.

“She had good times in the last days of her life and she was aware ‘that I’m not going to live forever,’ but was able to appreciate the life she had,” Perry said.