Hospice care is a special kind of care that focuses on the quality of life for people and their caregivers experiencing advanced, life-limiting diseases. Hospice care gives compassionate care for people in their last phases of an incurable disease so that they might live as comfortably and fully as possible.

The hospice philosophy accepts the reality of death as the final stage of whole life; it confirms life but doesn’t try to postpone or hasten death. Hospice care offers treatment to a person and the signs of the disease instead of treating the disease itself.

A team of highly skilled professionals manages symptoms so that the person may spend his last days of life with dignity and quality, always surrounded by loved ones. Hospice care is also a family-centered service, and it includes the patient and his family in making decisions.

When should a person start hospice services care?

Hospice care is mostly used when a disease such as cancer reaches a point when treatment may no longer cure or heal it. In general, hospice care must be sued when someone is expected to keep living around 6 months or less if the disease runs its expected and usual course. People with advanced cancer must talk with their family and doctor to choose when to begin hospice care.

Studies have shown that hospice care isn’t started soon enough. Sometimes a patient, doctor, or a family member will resist hospice as they may think that it means giving up or that there isn’t any hope left. It is also important to know that you can leave this hospice care and get into active cancer treatments any time you wish to.

But the hope which hospice brings is a life of quality, making the best of every day in the very last stages of advanced disease.

A few doctors don’t bring up the hospice facility so that the patient or a family member may decide on starting the conversation. If your treatment isn’t working fine anymore and you have also run out of options of treatment, then you may want to ask your doctor or your member of the cancer team of hospice.

So what does home hospice cover?

All hospice providers should offer you certain services. But they tend to have a different approach to service, types of support offered, and staffing patterns.

Palliative care and control of symptoms:

Palliative care might also be known as supportive care, comfort care, or symptom management. It may be given separately from hospice care, but it is often a part of your hospice acre if cancer is no longer being treated as it has worsened.

Palliative care doesn’t help in treating cancer itself. But instead, it is used to prevent treatment of symptoms and the side effects as quickly as possible. As part of hospice care, palliative care also looks at how the experience of cancer affects a person and helps relieve the symptoms, stress, and pain.

It is all about assuring that all care needs are being addressed. The specialized professionals that are part of the palliative care team may help look for and also manage physical, mental, social, emotional, and spiritual issues which may come up.

A hospice facility is a great help for people with limited motion and who have developed illnesses running their quality of life.