Free Republic

NEW BRAVOS, TX (WCMH) – An Army veteran in Arizona with a terminal illness has a unique final wish. Lee Hernandez is currently in hospice care in his home. According to the Arizona Republic, he has continuous strokes that affect his vision and cognitive abilities. Doctors can do nothing more for him except make him comfortable. Lee served more than 18 years in the Army, including a tour in Iraq. Earlier this week, he asked his wife to let him hold his phone, “in case someone calls,” according to a post on the Arizona Veterans Forum.

It has been a very emotional roller coaster type of week for me and my two siblings. Last Monday night my Father was taken to the Emergency Room and was diagnosed with severe dehydration. For the last two months he has been eating less and less and has made know to all of us that he wants to die. He is 93 and two weeks ago we found out that he has imminent heart failure. His heart is just worn out and at his age he will not be getting a heart transplant. He had bypass and heart valve replacement...

LANSING — The federal government’s involvement in health care policy has grown dramatically over recent decades. But when it comes to how and where health care services are delivered, and who may or may not provide care, state governments still play a major role — one Michigan is performing badly. That's the message from a panel of experts from Michigan and elsewhere recently assembled in Lansing, who offered some specific reforms that would make care more accessible and affordable in this state. The panel of four experts assembled for a Mackinac Center event called “Free Market Solutions to Problems in...

Five individuals who have donated to Democratic politicians pleaded guilty to a scheme that drained Medicare out of $33 million dollars. Two physicians and three owners of hospice and home care companies based out of Detroit, Mich., were charged on June 18, 2015 as part of the largest Medicare fraud case in history for submitting fraudulent claims for home health care and hospice services that were either not provided or deemed medically unnecessary.The elaborate operation revolved around Muhammad Tariq, Shahid Tahir, and Manawar Javed—the owners of the home health care and hospice companies—paying kickbacks and bribes to physicians for referrals...

The owner of a Frisco medical company regularly directed nurses to overdose hospice patients with drugs such as morphine to speed up their deaths and maximize profits and sent text messages like, “You need to make this patient go bye-bye,” an FBI agent wrote in an affidavit for a search warrant obtained by NBC 5. The executive, Brad Harris, founded the company, Novus Health Care Services, Inc., in July 2012, according to state records. Novus’ office is on Dallas Parkway in Frisco. No charges have been filed against Novus or Harris. Harris, 34, did not return messages left with a...

Off the record, a colleague of mine with decades of hospice experience predicted to me that the government would eventually get rid of the requirement that hospices hire chaplains. This particularly caught me off guard because I had just procured such a position with Center for Hope Hospice in Elizabeth, NJ. He elaborated that "the government wants to save money. They say America is becoming more secularized anyway, and so chaplains aren't needed all that much." Not that my shiny new job offer was about to vanish and "go gentle into that good night," but I was nettled by the...

Apollo 14 astronaut Edgar Mitchell, who became the sixth man on the moon when he and Alan Shepard helped NASA recover from Apollo 13's "successful failure" and later devoted his life to exploring the mind, physics and unexplained phenomena such as psychics and aliens, has died in Florida. He was 85. Mitchell died Thursday night at a West Palm Beach hospice after a short illness, his daughter, Kimberly Mitchell, said. Mitchell's passing coincides with the 45th anniversary of the Apollo 14 mission, which ran from Jan. 31 to Feb. 9, 1971. Mitchell, one of only 12 humans to set foot...

Blues legend B.B. King is battling health problems, with a message on his website saying the 89-year-old musician is in "home hospice care." King was admitted to a Las Vegas hospital Thursday afternoon, CNN affiliate KLAS reported, because his daughter, Patty King, said he wasn't eating and was dehydrated. Tests showed King may have had a minor heart attack, she told KLAS. He was released and went home.

Republican Rep. Alan Nunnelee has been moved to hospice care following a seven-month fight with cancer. Morgan Baldwin, a consultant for the Mississippi Republican, said in a statement that doctors found a new tumor in Nunnelee and that “no further medical treatment is possible.” “After seven months of bravely fighting brain cancer and a stroke, Congressman Alan Nunnelee was informed last Friday that a new tumor has developed and no further medical treatment is possible,” Baldwin said. “On Monday of this week, Alan came home and is resting comfortably with family. The family continues to ask for your prayers and...

FULL TITLE: Hospice worker who 'fondled and sodomized' nursing home patients escapes jail because his victims died or had dementia and couldn't testify A hospice worker accused of fondling and sodomizing elderly patients had rape, sodomy and sexual assault charges against him dropped because the victims had died or succumbed to Alzheimer's and couldn't testify. Walter Javier Martinez, 45, had been facing felony charges in connection with numerous episodes of sexual abuse while working at three St Louis-area nursing homes as an employee of Odyssey Hospice. The charges were replaced with four misdemeanor counts of elder abuse, to which Martinez...

The Obama administration on Friday backed down on restrictions of private insurance coverage for hospice drugs under Medicare, saying the regulations were preventing some terminally ill patients from having access to medicine. Under Medicare's Part A hospital program, hospices receive daily payments for each patient but are responsible for all drugs related to a patient's terminal illness. Medicare Part D covers only prescriptions and medications for curative conditions that are unrelated to a terminal illness.

Under the rules that took effect in May, hospice patients or their families could not fill prescriptions through their Part D drug plans until first confirming that the prescriptions were not covered by hospice providers. Drugs related to palliative and comfort care are supposed to be covered under the fixed rate payments to the hospice. Medicare announced Friday that the rules would be revised so that the additional authorization would be required for only four types of medications: pain relievers, anti-nauseants, laxatives, and anti-anxiety drugs that are “nearly always” considered hospice-related.

Fred Phelps Sr., the founder of the Kansas church held in disgust worldwide for its antigay protests of prominent funerals, is in hospice care and "on the edge of death," according to one of his estranged sons. Nate Phelps posted the information on Facebook Saturday night, adding the revelation that his father had been excommunicated from the church in 2013. A church spokesman told the Topeka Capitol-Journal that Phelps was indeed in the hospice but that Nate Phelps "is not well informed." The spokesman also refused to comment on the allegation that the elder Mr. Phelps has been excommunicated. Another...

You know Fred Phelps. You loathe Fred Phelps. You despise everything he stands for, like his family members’ infamous protests at soldiers’ funerals with their awful “God Hates Fags” signs. They’ve been a symbol for many years of the religion-based animosity against the LGBT community — to the point that they’ve been labeled a “hate group” and even the most fundamentalist Christian groups denounce his church’s activities.... /snip/... Tonight, on Facebook, Nate (one of Fred's sons, excommunicated from the church) posted this: I’ve learned that my father, Fred Phelps, Sr., pastor of the “God Hates Fags” Westboro Baptist Church, was...

Hospice patients are expected to die: The treatment focuses on providing comfort to the terminally ill, not finding a cure. To enroll a patient, two doctors certify a life expectancy of six months or less. But over the past decade, the number of “hospice survivors” in the United States has risen dramatically, in part because hospice companies earn more by recruiting patients who aren’t actually dying, a Washington Post investigation has found. Healthier patients are more profitable because they require fewer visits and stay enrolled longer. The proportion of patients who were discharged alive from hospice care rose about 50...

From East Texas Medical Center: Country Music Hall of Fame member and American country music singer Ray Price, 87, plans to leave East Texas Medical Center in Tyler today to go to his home in Mt. Pleasant for home hospice care. Price was diagnosed in 2011 with pancreatic cancer, and despite aggressive treatment, the cancer has recently spread to his liver, intestines and now his lungs. He has been in and out of hospital care for the past few months and was recently readmitted with complications. Price and his wife of 45 years, Janie, have decided to not pursue any...

The tragic reality of 'covert euthanasia' Thursday, June 27, 2013 - By Matt C. Abbott Pope Francis has spoken about the tragic reality of “covert euthanasia.”From a May 6, 2013 Catholic News Service :While the fight to preserve life is often centered on abortion and capital punishment, the future Pope Francis also warned against a more subtle form of disregard for human dignity—what he called “covert euthanasia.”“In this consumerist, hedonist and narcissistic society, we are accustomed to the idea that there are people that are disposable,” among them, the elderly, then-Cardinal Jorge Mario Bergoglio said in a recently published book.Citing...

Senator George McGovern is receiving hospice care. The family announced Monday afternoon that the senator is in Dougherty Hospice House in Sioux Falls. It was just in August when the former Democratic presidential candidate gave up his homes in Mitchell and Florida to spend more time near family in Sioux Falls. His daughter told The Associated Press on Monday that the longtime South Dakota senator is "coming to the end of his life." Ann McGovern declined to elaborate, but noted her 90-year-old father's recent health problems. Last October, he was treated for exhaustion after a lecture tour. Two months later,...

PIERRE, S.D. (AP) -- Longtime former U.S. Sen. George McGovern, the Democratic presidential candidate who lost to President Richard Nixon in a historic landslide, has moved into hospice care near his home in South Dakota, his family said Monday. "He's coming to the end of his life," his daughter, Ann McGovern, told The Associated Press.

Former Detroit Lions great Alex Karras is in failing health and currently in hospice care. Karras, who played with the Lions from 1958-62 and then again from 1964-70 after sitting out a season for his role in a gambling scandal, is suffering from kidney failure and according to a report published Monday night in the Detroit Free Press, has been given a short amount of time to live. Lions team president Tom Lewand issued the following statement Monday night: "The entire Detroit Lions family is deeply saddened to learn of the news regarding the condition of one of our all-time...