Eligibility
Hospice services are available to patients of all ages, incomes, ethnicities and cultural backgrounds
who:
- Have a life-limiting illness. Life-limiting illnesses include cancer, pulmonary disease, heart
disease, renal failure, Alzheimer’s disease, ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), AIDS, stroke/coma, etc.;
- Have a prognosis of six months or less. Care continues beyond six months if the patient’s
physician continues to certify a six-month prognosis; and
- Have decided that the primary goal of treatment is no longer cure but rather comfort.
Comfort takes the form of palliative care. This is the active total care of the body, mind and spirit.
The purpose of palliative care is to prevent or lessen the severity of pain and other symptoms and
to achieve the best quality of life for people dying or suffering from a life-limiting disease. People
with a life-limiting disease may benefit from palliative care from the time they are told they have the disease; while receiving treatment such as chemotherapy, radiation, Phase I clinical trials or blood transfusions; and especially near the end of life.
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