1. Hospice care is patient and family focused. Hospice supports the whole person and the family. In addition to managing physical concerns, social, emotional, and spiritual factors are also addressed. Hospice helps families deal with the range of emotions that surround this difficult time, offering guidance from social workers and chaplains. In addition, hospice will also offer the family bereavement and grief counseling after a loved one has passed and help with some of the after-death tasks that need to be completed.
2.Hospice care empowers individuals and families. Hospice provides information to individuals and families so they know what to expect. Patients can control how they live out their final months; caregivers can benefit from physical and emotional support while spending quality time with their loved ones. Hospice workers have been there before -- many times. Families find the experience they bring to the table invaluable as they navigate end-of-life care.
3. Hospice offers a familiar environment. Research has shown that people would prefer to die in comfortable or familiar surroundings rather than in an institutional setting. Hospice will come to the patient wherever he or she calls home.
4. Research shows longer mean survival length and greater patient satisfaction for persons receiving hospice care.
- A 2015 review study reported that patients who received hospice care had greater satisfaction and superior symptom control compared with those who did not receive hospice care. In addition, hospice care might be associated with longer survival compared with “aggressive” care outside of a hospice. Some hospice recipients even experience an improvement in their condition, resulting in “graduating” from hospice services.
- A 2016 study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association indicates a better end-of-life experience for cancer patients who died with the support of hospice as compared with a hospital's intensive care department. In addition, when hospice care was provided for more than three days, families reported a better end-of-life experience than those patients who received hospice care for three days or less. Further, family members of patients who did not receive hospice care, or who received three days or less, indicated that their loved one was less likely to have died in the patient's preferred location (i.e. 40% passed away in their preferred location versus 73% of those who had more than three days of hospice care). "In this study we found that patients' preferences influenced the care that they received.”
5. Hospice care prevents or reduces trips to the emergency room. Although the patient might still go to the hospital for tests or treatments, hospice allows patients and their loved ones to remain in control of care.
6. Families receiving hospice services report healthier grieving. Early referral to hospice allows families time to prepare for the changes they face, giving them time to say goodbye, and reducing the chance that the family’s grief will be prolonged and complicated.
7. Hospice care can free patients to have a time of personal growth, allowing them to get the most they can out of the time they have left. Patients might use this time to:
- Enjoy time with the people they love and who love them.
- Reconnect with a loved one from whom the patient has been estranged and heal emotional wounds.
- Visit favorite places or those with special meaning, such as a school, house, or location with a beautiful view.
- Put financial affairs in order.
- Reflect on life.
- Create a legacy gift, such as a journal, artwork, or a videotaped message.
