Specialized Care

If you or a loved one suffers from COPD, you know that it can significantly affect your life and your lifestyle. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) is one of the leading causes of death in the United States and the mortality rate keeps rising despite new treatments. In 2014, 6.8 million Americans were newly diagnosed with COPD. The rise is related to the increasing number of women smokers, and also because former smokers are aging and becoming symptomatic. COPD frequently co-exists with another medical condition or diseases, such as cardiac disease or diabetes and it can be more symptomatic and harder to manage comfortably, than the primary condition.
Specialty palliative care for patients with COPD can help alleviate symptoms, improve quality of life and decrease hospitalizations. With the help of medications and other interventions offered by a trained staff, patients who are not ready for hospice or do not choose it can benefit from care earlier in their illness. Considering the physical and emotional toll symptoms can take, palliative care aims to ease pain, insomnia and shortness of breath, as well as anxiety, depression and other intense emotions.

Palliative care works with curative care, including aggressive treatment or hospitalization if the patient or the family desires. At Hospice of the Western Reserve, our palliative care team collaborates with patients, loved ones, caregivers, referral sources and other healthcare professionals to provide holistic support for patients with COPD.
 

Hospice of the Western Reserve implemented an AIDS program in the 1980s when AIDS was an epidemic. We became the first Ohio hospice with a residential hospice care setting to specialize in caring for AIDS patients facing the end-of-life. For many years, we were the only hospice in the state to receive federal funding via the Ryan White grant program which ensured reimbursement for residential AIDS patients.

With the advent of powerful new drug therapies, excellent preventive education and a shift to a more accepting culture, AIDS is becoming less prevalent and less deadly.  Statistics show that new infections are being diagnosed in our service area but deaths remain low as people are seeking care within the first three months of diagnoses. Far fewer patients with AIDS present to us at the end of their life. Some enter hospice because they have more than one condition and their HIV infection complicates their care.

To offer the best possible medical, emotional and psychosocial care for our patients with HIV/AIDS, whether the disease is a primary of secondary illness, we offer the following: ​

• A dedicated team specially trained in caring for individuals with HIV/AIDS.

• A research program partnering with Case Western Reserve University, offing access to resources from both organizations.

• HIV/AIDS Team which attends specialized HIV/AIDS case management meetings keeping up-to-date on care options

If your child has been diagnosed with a life-threatening or chronic illness our pediatric palliative care program may offer the help you and your family needs. We strive to ease children's pain, fulfill their desires and tend to their comfort. Care is provided wherever the child lives—at home, in a residential facility or hospital or at one of our care centers.

Our program complements other treatment options, including curative care. You do not have to forego curative treatment for your child to receive pediatric palliative care. Even a child in a neonatal or pediatric intensive care unit can benefit from specialized pain control, symptom management and emotional support offered through our program.

Your pediatric team also understands the stress that childhood illness creates for the whole family, especially any siblings, and supports the entire family during the illness and beyond. We help families navigate the healthcare system, make decisions and access benefits. The specialized team also assists by guiding families through recurring feelings of grief or sadness. Additional support is provided by trained volunteers.

Our team is here for you.
Pediatric care is provided by a specially trained team that works closely with a child's own physician and a team of expert pediatric physicians from leading health organizations, in order to create an individual plan of care. Your team includes a nurse practitioner, pediatric nurse, social worker, spiritual care coordinator and expressive therapist. The Pediatric Team follows the child no matter where he or she stays—home, hospital, nursing center—offering consistency and stability.

 

Peaceful and Proud
​Providing end-of-life care for those who have served in our Armed Forces requires sensitivity, understanding and respect. Hospice of the Western Reserve has developed a dedicated program called Peaceful & Proud to meet the special needs of veterans.
Veterans who face issues related to their military experiences find meaning in the emotional and spiritual components of hospice care. Support is even more crucial for those who do not have a strong network of family and friends. Our staff and volunteers are trained to help manage post-traumatic stress disorder and other psychosocial service-related issues impacting veterans, such as remorse, regret, anxiety and substance abuse. We also offer veteran-to-veteran volunteering matches, where we place hospice patients with volunteers who can relate to them as fellow service members.

Patients are encouraged to heal through self-expression, legacy work, storytelling and music and art therapies. We also offer spiritual care and counseling, help with navigating benefits and recognition for military service through meaningful  ceremonies are among the other special services offered to veterans and their loved ones.

Veterans Recognition Ceremonies
Hospice of the Western Reserve conducts both private and public Veteran Recognitions that range from intimate ceremonies involving a single hospice patient and close family members to large public ceremonies with hundreds of participants. The Veteran Recognitions are available to all veterans, whether or not they have any affiliation with hospice.
 

Our expert staff and volunteers can begin to help dementia patients and their loved ones immediately after diagnosis. Whether the onset of dementia is caused by Alzheimer's disease, vascular dementia because of strokes, Parkinson's disease or a number of other conditions that result in memory loss and cognitive decline, our specialized services can help.
Caring for a loved one with memory loss and cognitive decline can be overwhelming and confusing.  Hospice of the Western Reserve can be an entry point to services that guide and support both the patient and their loved ones through the many phases of dementia.
Services include:

• An overview of what to expect
• Assistance with advance care planning
• Art and music therapy
• Emotional and psychosocial support
• Patient advocacy and assistance with community referrals
• Grief counseling for both the individual and family members

Palliative care consultations addressing:

• physical symptoms
• emotional and spiritual issues
• depression and behavioral problems
• patient safety at all phases of the illness
• medication adjustments
• nutritional issues