Once the hospitalist discharges the patient, primary care physician gets all electronic hospital records, through the EMR system. Through this method, specialist doctors and primary care physician get access to same data about the patient.
Moreover, when the physician refers the hospice as a late referral, for instance at the last month or last few weeks of end of the life, whole family could get abandon with the message. This is why it is important patient get the Hospice care at least at last 6 months of end of life, when family also get to know and get familiarize with care taking nurse, counselors, pastors or volunteers letting family members also to take a break from the routine. According to Hospice, 90% of patients die at where they call their home. This is one the best benefits of Hospice. It is also surprising, most do not know Hospice allow care taking at home, not always in the in-patient units. Once the patient is under Hospice care, they too do not aggressively expect to see the primary physician. However, Hospice bridge the gap by keeping the physician informed on the progress of the patient which benefit both physician as well as the family.
According to facts, 90% of Americans expect to die at home, yet it is reported only 25% do. When patients die at the hospitals, thy do not get the real contact they need with the physician, lack of emotional support to family members or hospitals may not quite know what should expect in dying process in the end of life cycle. In contrary, Hospice is good at symptom management in end of life process. Most importantly, hospice gives the patient the control of what they really need. One objective of Hospice during end of life of patient is to ease the burden family go through. Most patients with the critical illnesses expect this fact commonly from Hospice. Further, Hospice offer the service for additional 13 months once patient passing away, which is the part of the law. Such service offer counselling or taking care of family as when needed to manage the loss of the patient.
In this context, further understanding of what Palliative care and what Hospice care is discussed. Palliative care is a contemporary term, which refers to palliation, meaning “make better”. Basically, it is to free the patient from symptoms. For instance, for patient to take palliative care, it does not necessarily need to be a terminal situation. Thus, palliative medicine is mainly for symptom management or pain control. In contrary, Hospice is a former palliative med which handles both pain and symptom management. The difference is to undergo Hospice care, patient should be in the “terminal” or “end of life” stage with a probability of six months or less life expectancy. On the other hand, Hospice also support to extend life expectancy. For instance, Hospice care takers comes and visit the patient every week or so, and ensure patient is comfortable with different conditions patients undergo. Thus, Hospice get the opportunity to monitor the patient more closely.
