How can hospice help?

Hospice care is flexible and adapts to your needs. There are four levels of care designed to support patients and families through different stages and situations. These levels are defined by Medicare and most insurance providers, and they ensure that patients receive the right type of support at the right time.

This is the most common type of hospice care.

• Care happens at home, in a nursing home or in an assisted living facility
• A team may include nurses, aides, social workers, chaplains, and volunteers
• The focus is on comfort, managing symptoms, and emotional support

Most people start and maintain this level of care.

This is for situations when someone has a medical crisis requiring more attention.

• Hospice staff provide care in the home for several hours at a time
• Helps manage serious pain, trouble breathing, anxiety, or other urgent symptoms
• Once things are stable, care may return to the routine level

This is short-term care meant to keep the person comfortable during a difficult moment.

If symptoms cannot be managed at home, care can be provided in a facility.

• This may take place in a hospital, hospice center, or skilled nursing facility
• The goal is to bring symptoms under control quickly
• Afterward, care may return to the home setting

This is usually a short stay focused on comfort and symptom relief.

Hospice also supports caregivers who need a break. Family members can become exhausted with the many demands and emotional difficulties associated with being the caregiver of a hospice patient. To provide temporary relief to the patient’s primary caregiver, respite care can be provided in a hospital, hospice facility, or long-term care facility. The patient is transferred back to their place of residence after this period of respite care.

• The patient stays in a facility for up to 5 days
• This gives family or caregivers time to rest or attend to personal needs
• It is available occasionally when caregivers need temporary relief

This care supports the well-being of the entire family, not just the patient.

Medicare, Medicaid, Tricare and most private insurance plans cover hospice care. Sentara hospice team members can help guide you through the qualifying factors for hospice care.

Get care planning and hospice guidance now

Hospice care starts when a doctor determines that a person’s serious illness can no longer be cured or treated. At that point, the care team shifts their focus from curing the illness to providing comfort, improving the person’s quality of life, and offering needed support as they near the end of life.

How to request a referral for hospice care

Hospice can benefit those suffering from a disease where their life expectancy is approximately six months or less. Some patients may transition from palliative care to hospice as their condition worsens.

Most health insurance providers require a prognosis of six months or less if the illness runs its normal course for hospice coverage. People with a variety of conditions are eligible for hospice care.

Examples of illnesses that may benefit from hospice care include:

• Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS)
• Alzheimer's/dementia
• Cancer
• CVA and coma
• Heart disease
• HIV / AIDS
• Neuromuscular disease (end-stage)
• Renal failure
• Liver disease
• Pulmonary disease - COPD

The term “hospice” is sometimes used instead of “palliative care,” and “hospice” is often the better-known of the two. But they do not mean the same thing.

• Palliative care focuses on maintaining the highest quality of life while continuing your treatment. It concentrates on other needs, such as symptom management.
• Hospice care focuses on care and pain management, but not treatment, when a cure is no longer possible, or the burdens of treatment outweigh the benefits. Patients can be enrolled in hospice when their doctor believes they have fewer than six months to live.

Sentara also offers palliative care services

Care providers deliver hospice care wherever the patient lives, whether in their own home, a loved one’s home, a hospital, an assisted living facility or a nursing home. Sentara offers hospice care in several regions of Virginia.

Sentara hospice service areas

For many people, an assisted living facility or nursing home is their home, a place where they live and where they can receive the care and support they need. When a patient is ready for hospice, the hospice team will collaborate with the long-term care facility to provide care.

Combining the expertise of the nursing home staff with that of the Sentara hospice team will provide optimal care for the patients. Sentara offers the same hospice services in a long-term care facility as in the patient's home. Provisions of care in hospitals (inpatient) require additional qualifying needs.

Sentara Hospice also provides care in long-term care settings

Hospice care is provided by a team of experts trained in specialized care for patients as well as emotional support and care for their loved ones.

Hospice care team members include:

• Patient’s primary care provider 
• Hospice medical directors 
• Nurse Practitioners 
• Registered Nurses 
• Licensed Practical Nurses 
• Home health aides 
• Medical social workers 
• Clergy and counselors 
• Physical, occupational, and speech therapists 
• Trained volunteers 
• Dietitians 

Sentara hospice team members

Hospice provides continuing contact and support for family and friends for a minimum of 13 months following the death of a loved one. We also host bereavement and support groups for anyone in the community who has experienced the death of a loved one.

Hospice resources for patients and their loved ones