• Medicare
• Medicaid
• Private Insurance
• Donations
• People in need of hospice services receive these services without regard to their financial situation

1.

Volunteer your time:  Volunteers are an important part of hospice care.  Volunteers can work directly with patients, do bereavement follow-up, work in the office, or donate their professional talents.

2.

Donations to the Skagit Hospice Foundation:  Donations are often made to hospice as memorials to loved ones; this can be done at any time. Many people give gifts to hospice in their will through planned giving.

3.

Help make Hospice known in your community:  Many people do not know about the valuable services that hospice provides. If you know of someone who was helped by hospice, tell others what we do. Most of our clients appreciate our services tremendously, but our biggest complaint is that they wished they knew of us sooner.

Both home health care and hospice care are provided in the home by a team of health care professionals. Home health care is for those who are recovering from an illness, hospitalization, or surgery and tends to be more short-term. Hospice care is for those with life-threatening illness and is usually longer in duration than home health care. Hospice staff is specifically trained in the pain management and grief issues faced by people dealing with a life-threatening illness.

Although patients must have a physician's approval to be on hospice, the original referral need not come from a physician. Often it is the patient, a family member, or a hospital discharge planner who calls. After that call, a nurse or therapist makes an initial assessment and then follows up with the physician to facilitate approval of the referral.

Medicare covers nursing care, social services, and our entire hospice team, durable medical equipment, medications used for pain and symptom control, consulting physician’s fees relative to the terminal illness, certain hospitalization costs related to the illness, and bereavement support for the family.

Hospice admits patients without regard to their ability to pay. Medicaid and private Insurance may cover hospice services. We verify benefit coverage and bill private insurance or Medicaid when appropriate. The Skagit Hospice Foundation can cover the costs of uncompensated care.

Hospice staff is usually called in when a patient’s life expectancy is six months or less. The six- month life expectancy criteria is an established federal guideline for hospice programs and is related to reimbursement standards. More importantly, it is a realistic measure of the ideal length of time the hospice team needs with a patient and family to proved optimum assistance. We have patients who live well beyond the six-month prognosis and we continue to serve them and we have patients who die within the first few days or weeks of their admission. Part of our educational effort with physicians and the public is to encourage earlier referrals to Hospice for the benefit of the patient and family.

Many patients are not ready to talk about their illness or impending death, and we respect that. The patient or family has acknowledged the reality of the life-limiting illness by seeking hospice services. Hospice allows each person to establish his or her own level of outward acceptance with the assurance of a strong support system with or without verbal discussion of death. They may choose, instead, to address their immediate needs as they present themselves. We provide any services that are needed. If desired, a patient may choose to decline some areas of services, such as chaplain, volunteer, or a home health aid. A social worker does an initial assessment of the patient and/or family's psycho/social needs and continues involvement if the patient/family desires it.

We are not a religious organization. However, the nature of the hospice philosophy encompasses spiritual issues. Hospice patients may request visits from representatives of their own faith or from our chaplains if the wish to discuss spiritual issues.

Curative measures are intended to cure. Palliative measures provide pain and symptom control without the expectation of curing capabilities. When patients enter the hospice program they no longer wish aggressive treatment for their illness but wish to be comfortable and have a dignified end of their life.

Pain control is a priority for the hospice staff. They stay current on the latest pain control medications and technologies. Our goal is to enable the patient to be at home with loved ones, as comfortable and free from pain as possible.

When the caregiver can no longer cope with the care of the patient, hospice will cover 5 days of respite care in a skilled nursing facility so the family can rest. If the patient needs to stay longer, arrangements can be made through Medicaid or private insurance to continue the continuity of hospice care for the patient.

We provide hospice services to patients with life-threatening illnesses in nursing care facilities around the county. Hospice staff members do not duplicate the services provided by nursing home staff; they enhance the care-giving of the nursing home staff. They help patients and their family members prepare for death and also proved support to nursing home staff.

Support offered to the families of hospice patients that helps them cope with the death of their loved one. We offer bereavement support for up to one year after death. This includes personal visits or telephone calls, support groups (if they choose), and a bereavement newsletter.

Donations support both programs and services provided by Skagit Hospice and outreach sponsored by the Skagit Hospice Foundation. Such support may include but is not limited to funding for direct patient needs, special staff education, training for volunteers, community outreach, and/or uncompensated care for the uninsured. You can visit the donation page here: Donation

Hospice Team Volunteers are those who enjoy being with people, who have had experience in loss and death, and who don’t mind spending time with people who are in pain and are facing their last days of life. You can visit the volunteer page here: Volunteer