> As my mother was dying, hospice was a godsend. But, we only had them for two days. Hospice is not supposed to be a months-long ordeal!
Same for me. Last 2 days for both my mother and father-in-law. I suppose here will always be scammers in every industry who ruin it for the others. For me hospice was a godsend and I understand its value now. They also followed up with me to see how I and my wife were coping with their deaths and sent us handwritten notes. I got the distinct impression that the people that they chose for their jobs were mature, sincere, and above average in the compassion department. How can anyone speak ill of that? I guess progressive bean counters without a heart who are young and haven’t experienced the grip of death yet would be my guess. They will pay for the cold hearts later if they don’t see the light. Not everything is about money and being entertained in this life.
It seems to me that the scam of hospices is this:
At the end of a person’s life his health care costs become very expensive. The cheaper, more common, medicines and devices fail and the choice is either to use more expensive and sometimes questionable or even experimental treatments, or else to give up.
If a nurse or social worker talks a patient or his family into hospice care the following happen:
The patient’s healthcare provider does not have to pay for drugs and devices. That saves them apt of money.
The hospice owner has to treat pain and new acute conditions. These are not expensive to treat in general so it is relatively inexpensive for the hospice.
My understanding is that the hospice gets paid on a per-patient basis. The less medical care that is provided, the greater the profit for the hospice.
The only way this system can exist is if patients and their families give up hope of surviving the diagnosed illness that is thought to be killing the patient. The hospice system reaches the patients and their families with furrowed brows, phone calls, notes, cookies and other indicators of “compassion”. Some of the people who work there may be compassionate in real life, but the business model works if lots of people come in, they don’t get potentially life-saving treatments and they die quickly.