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Patient Care Activities (2008)
Charlene Thurston, R.N., A.N.P.
For Hospice Care of Nantucket Foudation’s Annual Meeting in September, we reviewed some statistics and successes regarding our Hospice’s patient care services, which we’d like to share with you, our readers. One area that is particularly noteworthy is the increasing number of clients served who are in earlier phases of their life-threatening illness. As you may know, hospices in the U.S. traditionally have served only terminally ill patients who are no longer receiving aggressive, curative treatment, and who have a life expectancy of 6 months or less. However, since our program began over 25 years ago, we have been dedicated to offering a full complement of services that meets the needs of the patient, family and community at large. This means not only offering care for terminally ill patients at end of life, but also serving patients with earlier stages of a life-threatening illness, from the time of diagnosis onward, whether or not they are pursuing aggressive, curative treatment. Such services are considered “palliative care services.”
Some of the statistics for the past year’s patient care services are as follows:
Comprehensive hospice & palliative care: 25 patients – this includes physical, psychosocial, spiritual care to patients in any setting – home, hospital, or nursing home – and support for their families both during the illness and for approximately 1 year after the death of a patient. During the calendar year of 2007, the average length of time for a patient to be on our service was 130 days, with a median of 47 days. Total number of days spent in the hospital for the group of patients was 105, while total number of days spent at home was 2758 days.
Palliative care consults: (These are consultation sessions for
persons in earlier stages of illness.)
Total number of individuals for private sessions – 11
Total number of private sessions – 63
Total number of individuals for Cancer Support Group
sessions – 12
Total number of Cancer Support Group visits – approx. 75
Community grief consults: (These are grief support sessions for community members who’ve experienced the death of a relative who was not a hospice patient.)
Total number of individuals – 12
Total number of private sessions – 87
(61 of which included relaxation/massage)
Caregiver support services: (These figures reflect services for mostly our non-hospice clients.)
Total number of individuals – 17
Total number of private sessions – 71
(49 of which included relaxation/massage)
Total number of individuals for “Time Out” group sessions: 5
Total number of “Time Out” group visits: approx. 50
Total number of clients: 82 (hospice patients and their families are counted as 1 client)
Total number of non-hospice clients: 57
Total number of non-hospice client visits: 346
(209 of which included relaxation/massage/yoga)
Evalutating our services is a very important part of our work. Over the years, we’ve regularly surveyed patients’ families who’ve used our comprehensive care services, and this year we have again received an excellent overall rating in satisfaction. Recently, we conducted a new survey for clients using our caregiver support services, and the results have been universally positive, with several caregivers expressing how much they’ve been helped in coping with the stress and worries that are so often experienced. Lastly, while we have not yet conducted a formal survey of clients using our palliative care services, we have received very positive informal feedback from those we’ve served. Our hope is to more formally survey both these clients and those receiving our grief support services in the future.
In addition to our patient care activity, we’ve continued to work closely with other hospital departments and agencies in meeting the needs of the community. Recently we’ve worked closely with the NCH Maternity Dept. to offer supportive resources to patients experiencing miscarriage or neonatal death. We’ve also worked with Our Island Home to make our Bereavement Services available to families of OIH residents who’ve died. During the NCH Health Fair, and again at the Senior Expo., we provided Advance Directives and information to participants with an invitation to consult with us for a free educational session focused on how to complete them. Finally, during the past school year, we had our first student intern, Molly MacKay, a wonderful high school senior who has now gone on to pursue her degree in nursing.
As always, we salute the colleagues from other hospital departments and agencies with whom we work, and give our sincere thanks to the Hospice Care of Nantucket Foundation for continuing its diligence in supporting this program, and in providing the funding so vital to its existence. Together we have all worked hard to ensure that patients facing life-threatening illness in our community feel well cared for during this most difficult period of their lives.
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