When to Seek Hospice Care

Finding Care That's Right for You

There are more than 4,500 hospice programs in the United States. All provide medical and comfort care and allow you to remain at home if desired and possible. But not all offer the same level of services. When evaluating whether a particular hospice program is right for you, you should ask to speak to the program's administrator. Here are some questions you should ask to determine if their services match your needs:

• Do you have a board-certified hospice and palliative medicine doctor on staff? Have the nurses and other staff members received training in palliative care?
• Does the palliative doctor make home visits?
• Do you have an in-patient unit with nurses hired and trained by your hospice?
• Do you offer open access services (this means that certain treatments, such as chemotherapy or radiation can be continued)?
• Can you provide injectable pain medicine in the middle of the night if needed?
• What services do you provide (for instance, social work, nutrition, bereavement, spiritual)?
• How many patients does each nurse visit? (Ideally, it shouldn't be more than 12 at a time.) Will the same nurse visit at least two times each week?
• Are you open nights and weekends?

To help you evaluate hospice programs, you may wish to review the chart from this Journal of the American Medical Association article. Although it is written for health care professionals, it contains a wealth of useful information that you may want to discuss with your doctor.

Find out about the availability of hospice and palliative doctors in your area by using our doctor finder.

For more guidance on choosing hospice care, visit CaringInfo.org, the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization's patient website.