In the bipartisan opioid bill headed to the president’s desk, hospice workers would be allowed to destroy patients’ unneeded opioids, reducing the risk that families misuse them.
Category: end of life
Is ‘Precision Medicine’ The Answer To Cancer? Not Precisely.
Doctors and hospitals love to talk about the patients they’ve saved with precision medicine, and reporters love to write about them. But the people who die still vastly outnumber the rare successes.
Creating Rituals To Honor The Dead At Long-Term-Care Facilities
Death and its companion, grief, are often ignored at nursing homes and assisted living centers, yet ignoring the loss can lead to depression, staff burnout and other problems.
A Late-Life Surprise: Taking Care Of Frail, Aging Parents
More and more older adults, age 60 and older, care for their elderly parents and face physical, emotional and financial stress.
Learning To Live Well With Dementia
Two leading experts on caring for people with Alzheimer’s offer ways to make life better for patients and their caregivers.
Missed Visits, Uncontrolled Pain And Fraud: Report Says Hospice Lacks Oversight
A new government watchdog report outlines vulnerabilities in Medicare’s $17 billion hospice program, pointing to inadequate services, inappropriate billing and outright fraud.
‘Like A Ghost Town’: Erratic Nursing Home Staffing Revealed Through New Records
Daily nursing home payroll records just released by the federal government show the number of nurses and aides dips far below average on some days and consistently plummets on weekends.
A Hospital’s Human Touch: Why Taking Care In Discharging A Patient Matters
Patients and caregivers often feel abandoned and lose trust in health care professionals when they sense a lack of caring during transitions. With it, they feel better able to handle concerns and act on their doctors’ recommendations.
Geriatric Assessments Could Fine-Tune Cancer Care For Older Adults
The American Society of Clinical Oncology issued a new guideline that recommends adults 65 and older receive a geriatric assessment when considering or undergoing chemotherapy.
