Amity Hospice

What is Hospice?

Hospice care is a type of health service that is offered to patients with a terminal illness or who are no longer seeking aggressive or curative treatments. Hospice care can help extend the quality of life for the individual, providing a comfortable atmosphere where they are taken care of and can live peacefully.

 

Where is Hospice Care Offered?

Patients with terminal illness can receive hospice care where they are living. This may include their private residence, independent living communities, assisted living facilities, memory care units, skilled nursing facilities, and hospitals.

 

What make Amity Hospice Special?

Amity Hospice is special because it concentrates on care-not cure.  Hospice services provided include:

 

Quality of Life

Amity Hospice is dedicated to helping our patients achieve physical and emotional comfort so that they can concentrate on living.

 

Routine Care

Routine care includes regularly scheduled visits to address the physical, emotional, and spiritual needs of hospice patients at their private home, assisted living facility, or nursing facility. The type, amount, and frequency of this treatment varies based on the patient’s unique plan of care.

• Routine care services can include:

• Skilled nursing services

• Home health aide services

• Physical & occupational therapy

• Speech-language pathology services

• Medical supplies for home use

• Durable medical equipment

• Medical social services

 

Respite Care

Respite care is short-term in-patient care provided to a patient only when necessary to relieve the family members or other persons caring for the individual at home. Respite care may not be reimbursed for more than five consecutive days at a time, including the date of admission, but not including the date of discharge.

In-patient respite care can only be provided at the following facilities:

• A Medicare-certified in-patient hospice facility

• A contracted Medicare-certified hospital or a skilled nursing facility that has the capability to provide 24-hour nursing

 

General Inpatient Care

General inpatient care is a higher level of care needed when pain or other symptoms cannot be managed at the patient’s home. This allows for round-the-clock care to administer medications, treatments, and emotional support to make the patient more comfortable. Patients return to their homes and routine home care when symptoms stabilize.

General inpatient care can be offered at:

• A hospice facility

• An inpatient hospice unit within a hospital

• A hospice unit within a nursing home

 

Continuous Care

Continuous home care consists predominantly of hospice and nursing care on a continuous basis at a patient’s home or long-term care facility. This type of care may only be provided during a period of crisis, in which a patient requires continuous nursing care to achieve palliation or management of acute medical symptoms.

Symptoms that require continuous care include:

• Unrelieved pain

• Severe shortness of breath

• Severe nausea or vomiting

• Anxiety or panic attacks

• A breakdown in the primary caregiver support system