Does anyone recover from hospice

Professional health care providers offer the end-of-life services to prepare people and their families for death. Hospice care is recommended for patients who have a life expectancy of six months or less. However, there are patients who are discharged from hospice services. Thirteen percent survived the 6 month period. On average, the length of time patients receive hospice care is 70 days. Doctors have great difficulty in predicting when a person will die from a life-threatening disease.

The main reason for discharge is that patients get better after entering hospice services. Some go into remission and are no longer terminally ill. Others improve because of consistent and personal medical care. The staff adjusts medications, manages pain, controls symptoms, and gives emotional and spiritual support.

Home hospice often provides nutritious meals, and social interaction. However, not that there are a variety of other reasons for ending hospice care:.

It is the way treatment, then the time for treatment to work, then the need for more time to see if the scans show any change. This takes weeks and months per treatment plan to see if anything is working.

I know this is not what you want to hear. I did not either. Ask to get the scans reviewed at another cancer center for peace of mind. Get a copy of the scan results in writing. No need to look at scans. Just reading the brain mets will break your heart. My wife had pages of mets. It is still the most shocking thing I have ever read in my life. So be prepared for what you will read. The best advise I can give from an inspire standpoint is always have hope.

Always be there for your mother and show her you are there with her. This time may be best spent cherishing the life that is now. She hears you, she is comforted by you and your peace during this difficult time will bring her greater peace. Sharing discussion reply. React Sign in or join to react.

In reply to Jbuell's comment. I'm so sorry to hear that! I pray there is still hope left, I think WBR adds swelling on top of swelling, so once she is finished with that I pray she gets some of her functionality back!

This is most likely a combo from the brain mets and the WBR. When radiation is done there is swelling in the brain and this is what steroids are for. It's not possible for anyone to know if she can come back from this or not.

You can only take one day at a time and see if there's any improvement. If they wean her off steroids, she may need to go back on again as many do.

Take care, Judy. Jbuell 6 years ago. Almost the same scenario is happening with my sister-3 weeks ago went to ER-she could not walk, barely able to lift her head. So many brain mets discovered that they said she had 2 weeks maybe left, and needed to contact Hospice for end of life care. She started on Decradon also, and it helped alot. She then had 5 WBR treatments. Her left side has remained somewhat immobile. She can use her arm somewhat, and move her leg around, but cannot walk.

She has trouble holding a bottle of water and getting it to her mouth. Like someone who had a stroke, but doc says it's because of the brain mets location. They are going to wean her off the Decradon beginning this week.

She did go for a 2nd opinion however. The oncologist at Stanford gave her some hope, but I don't think anything will come of it. He just told her to keep up her good attitude, nobody knows when death will happen, and if she gained some weight and was off of steroids she could begin a trial they had going there.

Basically, he said the same thing as the docs at the ER said, only kinder and gentler. I think that when the steroids stop she will decline even more. She isn't able to get out of bed at all now, but she has lived a week longer than the ER docs said she would. Mother was not in pain and enjoyed the extra attention she received from her Hospice Attendants. Hospice neither hastens nor postpones dying. The aim is to improve the quality of remaining life so patients can enjoy time with family and friends and experience a natural, pain-free death.

In some cases, hospice care can extend life. Most terminally ill patients experience less anxiety by refocusing hope on what might be realistically achieved in the time remaining.

If continuing uncomfortable and painful curative treatment for an illness is fruitless, hospice patients benefit more from having their symptoms treated instead. If need be, they can later return to hospice care. A patient can go on and off hospice care as needed—or if they change their mind and decide to return to curative treatment. They may also enter hospital for certain types of treatment if it involves improving their quality of life.

Hospice care is limited to a maximum of six months. In the U. Helpful Answer 6. DavidW63 Feb Is she a Hospice patient or a Palliative Care Patient? PC patients are seen by the Hospice staff but are also allowed to seek extra care such as x-rays and such. Also, the AL facility may be having her get the x-rays to make sure she has not hurt her head when she has fallen. Those may be unrelated to Hospice.

Talk with the Hospice staff and find out exactly what's going on with her and her level of care. In answer to Pamstegma, many patients keep their own physician unless to do so would cause more hardship.

If she is home or nursing home bound, they usually switch to the Hospice MD because they see them wherever they are home visits and regular MDs don't make housecalls. It sounds like you have a lot of questions that need answering, so talk with the Hospice RN or Social Worker.

By the way, a person can be in Hospice care for as long as they qualify, which on rare occasions can be years. I am a retired Hospice Chaplain and I had one patient for over three years. It was clear that she qualified because she had breast cancer and was gradually declining. It just took her longer than most people.

Ask your questions and you will get your answers from Hospice. Helpful Answer 5. I am a hospice social worker. Hospice is a level of care, provided by many different medical companies, and is dictated by Medicare rules regarding your insurance benefit. The next period is and all those that follow, are 60 days. During that time decline MUST be demonstrated. If the person does get better happens a lot they are discharged and can be readmitted when appropriate.

Usually there is a referral back to a primary provider or to home health a lesser level of care. As someone pointed out if a new condition develops while on hospice, that will certainly be treated. Hospice staff always works toward helping a patient and their family understand choice at end of life and what care may or may not be beneficial given their terminal diagnosis. For example a hospice patient with lung cancer may develop pneumonia and be a DNR, in which case the infection may be allowed to take its course with only comfort treatment thereby allowing the patient a more compassionate and quick end - but only if that is what the patient wants.

The rules have changed recently to allow patients to also pursue some care outside of hospice, including that which non-hospice providers view as curative, so there can be competing agendas between providers and more confusion for the patient and family. That fact has muddied the water considerably.

I like Luthel27s post - it may have been helpful to point out the sequence as written articulates myth vs fact to be more clear. That is no longer the case, even young people under Medicare age will be held to Medicare rules. The reason is because there was a period of intense Medicare fraud on the part of some hospice providers and the result was to really tightened up criteria for care and reimbursement on all providers. I will say, there is still the occasional hospice, usually for-profits vs non-profits that will try to keep a patient on that doesn't belong.

It isn't that easy to prove someone is terminal especially in cases of slow decline. You don't say what her living situation is or if you have DPOA-HC but if you do, I would insist on speaking with the doctor and the nurse and asking them the tough questions that are worrying you. There should be no problem getting answers if the service is above board.

If she is permanently in a nursing home, that would send up red flags for me as the home may be "dumping" care on the hospice and the hospice may be passively benefiting from billing. Many times there are corporate ties that aren't necessarily obvious.

In any case, your mom ought to be getting superior care just being on hospice because she will be monitored more closely. I hope this helps. My mom was on hospice - a totally Medicare benefit - for her last 18 mos in a NH. The first 90 days was 1 evaluation to start the benefit and thereafter it was every 60 days done by the hospice provider in conjunction with the medical director of the NH.

Really as long as they pass the criteria set by Medicare they can keep on Medicare paid hospice.