Hospice Care

History

Hospices originated as guest houses for travelers in need. Wounded crusaders and pilgrims suffering from disease could go to a so-called hospitium where they would get meals, receive treatment, and have a place of relative comfort for recuperation. The term hospice later came to refer to places to care for the sick and dying, especially the poor.

In the early 1960s, British physician Cicely Saunders led the way for the modern hospice movement when she practiced and advocated the use of compassionate care for the dying. Her pioneering work led to the establishment in 1967 of St. Christopher's Hospice in a residential suburb of London, England. St. Christopher's Hospice was originally a free-standing inpatient facility, but today, it offers care in a range of settings, including patients’ homes. The hospice movement took root in the United States during the 1970s. Today, some form of hospice care is offered on every continent. Help the Hospices, an international organization that supports the development of hospice and palliative care worldwide, estimates that 115 countries have one or more services that offer hospice or palliative care.

Two Gallup polls, one in 1992 and another in 1996, showed 9 out of 10 respondents reporting that they would prefer to be cared for at home if they were terminally ill with 6 months or less to live (Foreman, 1996; National Hospice Organization, 1996; Seidlitz, Duberstein, Cox, & Conwell, 1995). Because hospice care is now offered not only in various institutional settings, including hospitals and nursing homes, but also in people's own homes, hospice can be better understood as a system of care rather than a place for care.

Hospice Care in the United States

The National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO) is the largest nonprofit membership organization representing hospice and palliative care programs and professionals in the United States. The organization seeks to improve end-of-life care and to expand access to hospice care in order to enhance the quality of life for the dying and their loved ones. The NHPCO provides an annual summary of trends in hospice care in the United States, including information on patient and hospice provider characteristics, location and level of care, and role of paid and volunteer staff. These reports also provide links to other tools related to research on hospice, including performance measures and reporting tools. A number of scholarly journals offer national and international perspectives on hospice care. Among them is the American Journal of Hospice & Palliative Medicine, a multidisciplinary journal that publishes information on the medical, administrative, and psychosocial aspects of hospice and palliative care.

...