More terminally ill choosing to die at home, report finds

When asked, most Americans say they’d rather die at home than in a hospital.

A government report suggests that’s happening more than in the past, though nearly 40 percent of deaths still occur in hospitals — a shift that experts say has been fueled by a greater acceptance and availability of hospice care.

The percentage of at-home deaths increased to one-fourth in 2007, from one-sixth in 1989, according to the report by the National Center for Health Statistics.

The figure would be higher if the National Center for Health Statistics had included nursing homes in its definition of dying at home, as many experts do, since 28 percent of people over 65 died there in 2007.

Dr. Chris Feudtner, lead author of a 2008 study that observed a similar shift in where children die, said there’s been a “sea change” over the past two decades, not in people’s attitudes about dying, but in the use of at-home hospice care.



http://www.suntimes.com/4119792-417/more-terminally-ill-choosing-to-die-at-home-report-finds.html

the cost of LIVING is high enough already.

:shrug:



ed:sp

From the article:
Meanwhile, people generally have become more accepting of hospice care, in part because of studies showing that hospice patients typically enjoy a better quality of life in their final days than terminally ill patients who received more aggressive care, said J. Donald Schumacher, director of the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization.

At least one study has even suggested that hospice patients live longer on average than non-hospice patients, particularly those with pancreatic cancer, lung cancer and congestive heart failure.

If you are Steve Jobs (Apple) you get to pick and choose as to hospitals, livers and pancreas, even though no one else gets this opportunity.....including those of us who donate our organs.

Most of us are hoping for luck.

Our country is corrupted by Wall St and the ultra rich. They own our government. The rest of us are forced to submit to their wishes.

I'd choose home any day, and I'm an RN.

they would prefer to die at home. I remember
Elizabeth Edwards chose to die at home among friends
and family. In fact, this is how many people prefer
to handle their final days.

A fine man with a wonderful family, and of course he wants to die at home. Cancer, and it won't be much longer now. He is getting visiting hospice care.

I too would prefer home and family and friends and pets to a hospital. We need to assure that choice is available.

My mother was in a hospital in Dallas when she was dying. I flew down from CT. She had sold her house a couple of years before and gone into assisted living, then she fell and broke her arm and then had to go into a nursing home.

She just gave up. She stopped eating and literally starved herself to death. As horrible as it sounds, it is not a bad way to die, esp. if you don't have a chronic disease, like my 94 year old mother. She just wanted to die.

She could not have survived at home. We had to sell the house because she would be there by herself and I was far away in CT (she was in Texas). I had to do what was best for her. She needed assistance and this place was right for her. To this day I thank god she had it. A wonderful facility full of caring people.

Left in her house alone, she would be vulnerable to all kinds of predators. I could not let that happen...

Who the hell would choose to die in a hospital when they can be with their family and friends in their own home with hospice nurses providing palliative pain control and home health aides to help with personal care.
I work for a Home Health Care and Hospice agency and I have to say, it's the way I would want to go.

and she had money/choices. and home care costs money also.

to die at home. We kept her in her home for as long as was possible. She also had dementia as well, but we didn't send her to a nursing home because we knew her days were numbered and it were her wishes to be at home. It seemed cruel. We did get home helpers though. She ended up dying at a hospital though, but this at the very, very end.

I home it's doable when the time comes.

by the creation of hospice and home health services. Those two agencies make it possible for family and friends to care for a loved one better than we used to. I have often been asked to be part of the team that cares for the terminally ill. I was one of the people who would drop in to make sure the patient was taking their meds on time. This was when I was the first responder at the high rise where I lived.

Quietly and in peace.