Can short hospice enrollment be long enough?
OBJECTIVE: Hospice utilization lasting for 2 weeks or less before death is considered “short.” Short, late-stage hospice admissions have been viewed as inadequate for providing end-stage symptom management, maximal comfort, and a comprehensive focus on life closure and as an underutilization of the Medicare Hospice Benefit. The purpose of this study was to explore psychosocial dynamics during late-stage hospice admissions by comparing the perspectives of hospice professionals and family caregivers. Salutogenic principles and concepts from Antonovsky’s Sense of Coherence Theory (SOC) guided the inquiry. METHODS: This exploratory, descriptive study involved a developmental design. First, hospice professionals’ perspectives about psychosocial dynamics commonly observed in late-stage admissions were gathered. Themes were distilled into a Psychosocial Factors Checklist (PFC). Second, interviews that incorporated open-ended questions and the PFC were conducted with 56 family caregivers of ho
