Hospice isn’t a place. It’s a type of care that focuses on living; living as fully as possible, until the natural end of life.

As a true medical option, hospice offers the services and support that Americans want when coping with life-limiting illness. Considered to be the model for high-quality, compassionate care at the end of life, hospice provides a team of healthcare specialists that offer expert medical and nursing care, pain-and-symptom management, and emotional and spiritual support. All care is tailored to the patient’s unique needs and wishes.

The goal of hospice is to treat the person instead of the disease, and to support family caregivers as well as the individual patient. The focus is on providing a quality of life, not the length of time left to live.

The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization reports:

• Hospice usage in the U.S. is growing. More than 1.4 million Americans with life-limiting illness elected hospice care and were served by hospice professionals across the nation last year.
• The median length of time people receive hospice is 20.6 days (half of patients receive care for more days, half of patients receive care for fewer days). Yet most patients would benefit from hospice earlier -- in fact, the most frequent comment from families is “why didn’t we get hospice sooner?”
• Less than half of all hospice patients have a diagnosis of cancer, which surprises many people who mistakenly think hospice only serves cancer patients. Other hospice diagnoses include but are not limited to: heart disease, debility, dementia (this includes Alzheimer’s disease), lung disease, and stroke.
• Hospice is paid for by Medicare, Medicaid, most private insurance plans, HMOs and other managed care organizations. Hospices also care for people who don’t have insurance and can’t afford to pay for services. Ability to pay is not a requisite for hospice care.
• All hospices offer volunteer services. An estimated 400,000 specially-trained volunteers provided 5.1 percent of patient and family-related services to hospice patients last year. Hospice volunteers also assist with fundraising, community outreach and administrative work.
• Research has repeatedly shown that 8 out of 10 Americans would rather stay in their homes surrounded by family and loved ones if they were faced with a life-limiting illness. Hospice makes this happen for millions of patients each year.