Hospice Care

Fear is natural when you are facing a life-limiting illness. Many people face a whirlwind of emotions ranging from disbelief to anger to overwhelming sadness. Dealing with your physical needs is just part of the challenge of end of life care. You and your family also have to deal with stress, anxiety, emotions and spiritual needs.

But, you don’t have to face these challenges alone. When you begin hospice care, you open the door to a full range of compassionate care options that are designed to enhance your life, get you the care you need and ease emotional and spiritual distress for you and your family.

Working with your own physicians, your expert team will help develop a plan of care that meets your needs and lets you choose how you want to live. You can trust us to honor and respect your wishes – to help you along the way to make choices that work for you and your family.

Stay at Home

People don’t like to be in the hospital, but when you’re dealing with serious illness, you may find yourself back and forth to the emergency room, in and out of the hospital, back and forth to various doctor’s offices. It’s all very exhausting for you and your family. Studies have shown that hospice care reduces time in the hospital and helps avoid emergency room visits. In fact, many hospice patients actually live longer.

By coordinating your care at home and bringing the care to you, you can stay at home longer. If you do need a brief inpatient visit, it can be at Kansas City Hospice House™, which is much more like home than a hospital. If you live in an assisted living or long-term care facility, hospice care can be added on to the care you already receive. We work closely with facility staff to bring extra care and services that will help keep you comfortable and give comfort to your family.

We’ll be there to:

Coordinate your care – work with your doctor to establish a plan of care and communicate with all of your medical providers
Keep you comfortable – help control pain, shortness of breath, nausea, tiredness, trouble sleeping and other symptoms
Monitor your condition – regularly assess your condition and recommend adjustments in care that might be needed
Provide personal care – assist when needed with bathing, dressing and other personal care
Answer questions – help you and your family understand your illness and your options at every stage of your disease
Help you make choices – give you more information and help discuss choices with you and your family
Ease fear and anxiety – give emotional and spiritual support to you and your family
Handle the details – coordinate care with your doctor and other health care providers, including equipment needs
Be available – make regular visits and be on call 24 hours a day, every day for questions and visits

Your care team makes regular home visits and you can choose the services that you want. Your team can include nurses, doctors, hospice aides, social workers, chaplains, art or music therapists, volunteers and more.

Don’t Wait

One thing we hear so often from our families is that they wish they had called sooner. People who seek assistance early in their diagnosis have more options, more support, better quality of life, a chance to make decisions on how they want to be treated, and time to build trusting relationships with their caregivers. In fact, hospice can help people live longer.

Quality of Care You Can Rely On

Kansas City Hospice & Palliative Care is consistently rated among the best in the nation for the quality of care that we offer our families. Learn more about our quality scores.

Eligibility and Coverage

In general, hospice care is covered by Medicare and most insurance plans when life expectancy is less than six months. Some people do better and are released from hospice. To learn more about eligibility, what is covered and payment details CLICK HERE