Your are reading Part 1 of my series, “What to expect from your hospice nurse.” You can catch the entire series by visiting the landing HERE.

Recently I wrote THIS ARTICLE with advice on choosing the right hospice provider.

I had a couple comments with suggestions to write an article reviewing what someone should expect from their hospice nurse.

In general, this blog has been about “Telling Stories and Helping Nurses.” I have never considered this website as a place to educate the general population on hospice care.

Over the last few weeks I have realized that a series on what to expect from your hospice nurse could serve two purposes. I can educate the community, and I provide what I believe is best practice by hospice nurses in general.

What to expect from this series

This series will not be an exhaustive review of hospice care. In the next article I will review some of the general guidelines as they pertain to your nurse’s behavior.

Not all hospice providers are the same. Each organization has different policies that operate within the Medicare general guidelines. This means that I will be providing suggestions and ideas that I believe are best practice. Through this blog and my podcast, I have discovered that a majority of hospice providers will also agree with this series.

Just because I write a few articles on what you should expect from your hospice nurse, does not mean this will be your experience. Much of what I will be sharing is not mandated by Medicare, but rather what I believe is best practice.

This series is what I have taught numerous nurses here in Kansas City. It is also what I teach nurses in my private community, and what I have covered in my podcast.

I will release one article per week on Saturday mornings until the completion of the series. I can’t give you a total at this time because I’m still generating ideas for articles.

The final outcome

My hope for the final outcome of this series is two fold.

The main purpose is that you, the hospice patient or family member, will have a deeper understanding of what it means to be a nurse who works in hospice. This series is called “what to expect from your hospice nurse,” but, by the end, you will also know, “what not to expect from your hospice nurse.”

As a by-product of this series, I hope a few hospice nurses will feel encouraged and empowered by this series. As a hospice nurse, it is easy to find ourselves at the bottom of the rabbit hole of hospice care, looking up and wondering to ourselves, “How did I end up down here and miserable?” It is really easy for hospice nurses to completely lose ourselves in this work. We easily develop genuine feelings for our patients. This can cause a complete dismantling of our personal boundaries. By the end of this series, I hope hospice nurses find empowered to rethink some of their habits and reboot their career in hospice.

In closing, I hope you will take a couple minutes and share each episode of this series to your social media account. I won’t get anything financially from the sharing of this material, but I will get the feeling that comes with helping the community at large have a deeper understanding of hospice care. That’s reward enough for me.

A few new subscribers would be nice to have as well! 😉

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James

James worked on-and-off as an LPN for over 20 years. In 2014 he completed a bridge program and became an RN. James became a hospice nurse in January 2015. He lives in the Kansas City area with his wife of over 30 years, 4 daughters and 2 sons in law.