Hospice Employees & Their Functions

Medical Director-- Head of all medical staff at the facility. Oversees nurses and other doctors to make sure that they are doing their job correctly. Physicians--Maintains a relationship with the patient and family to advise on medical proceedings regarding last wishes. Also prescribes medications.

Nurses (RN)--Assists with patient care including administering medicine and other treatments, keeping an eye on patient status and assisting with family needs.

 Social Workers--Assist patients and

family with grief and anxiety before and after death.

Pastoral Workers--Offers spiritual

support for patients and family.

Nurse Assistants (CNA)--Mainly assists

with comfort measures such as changing sheets and bandages, assisting with bathing patients, etc...

Untrained Help and Hospice

Because of its nature as a palliative care program, hospice often involves help from untrained family members and volunteers to assist with patient care.

Family members act as primary care givers in the home setting.

Volunteers can assist the family with daily needs such as shopping and watching the patient in a time of need.

Untrained help continued....

Because of their lack of medical training, family care and volunteer help presents some issues.....

Family needs to keep an eye on the patients health status but they are not trained medical professionals.
They are often expected to administer basic treatments and potentially lethal medications such as morphine.

This also presents opportunities to steal scheduled medications

This is not limited to the family and community help, nurses have been implied in many medication theft cases as well.

Patients Wishes

When it comes to death, many people have specific plans as to what level of treatment they wish to receive. All of which pose questions for patients, family, and staff alike... It is up to the Hospice to acknowledge these wishes and act upon them.

Pain medication...

Where to spend the last days....

Do Not Resuscitate Orders... IV water and Food... All of these play a crucial role into a patients level of comfort and how prolonged death will be.

Communication

Because most patients have last wishes, communication plays a large role in the hospice experience....

Patients have to convey wishes to the staff, but this can present problems...

Some Patients cant speak due to illnesses.

Family may have different perceptions of someones last wishes than the actual patient. And an agreement must be found
Cultural Communication issues....

 Cultural communication issues are a

problem within hospice...

Our country is composed of many minorities who speak all different languages and have different perceptions of death.

Most hospice nurses are white and not multilingual, providing racial barriers.
Studies show that different races prefer different information from the hospice based on their perceptions of death. Caucasians want the facts bluntly and open, Whereas latinos prefer not to know that someone is dying and what the prognosis is.