Something to Think About

It is certainly not within our role to act if a person, in the pain of the moment, wants help in ending their life. In the “pain of the moment”...

Be the best hospice you can possibly be, provide the highest quality of care with the most compassionate, caring staff your area has to offer. Build a reputation within the...

When living with a life threatening illness we are eating for two---our physical body and our disease. In most cases the disease eats before we do. If we don’t eat,...

For healthcare professionals it is often a balancing act to care for patients and then deal with the sense of futility that is triggered when they are doing their job...

There are other signs of approaching death that indicate a person with a disease (at any age) has weeks to live...

I can say that dementia doesn’t play by the rules for end of life. Withdrawing and sleeping can be present for years and does not signify approaching death. Not eating...

...Fortunately, I suppose, my mother is now bed-bound and we were able toget Hospice to help out, so she now fits the bill for a 'model patient'... but itstill seems...

From the moment of a diagnosis of a life threatening illness we begin grieving. We grieve not just the eventual losses that come with serious illness but the approaching death...

We often think because a person is facing the end of their life we have to do whatever they want us to, regardless of how it affects us. We treat...

I know “dying of a broken heart” is used frequently when death comes as a result of a tragic life event. I’m not sure that is actually why the person...

Timing of the “hospice” talk is important as well as having an end of life talk before having the hospice talk. 

People with unpleasant personalities while living will still have unpleasant personalities while dying. It is just that the closer to death they get, the less energy they will have to...