What is hospice care

  Hospice care is not a cure, but rather a medical care that focuses on reducing symptoms and slowing the progression of the disease in the weeks or even months before the patient dies.  What is needed most is physical comfort, pain control, life care and psychological support, so the goal is to shift from treatment to symptomatic treatment and care.  2. Maintain human dignity Although patients are in the dying stage, their personal dignity should not be diminished due to the reduced vitality of life, and their personal rights should not be deprived due to physical failure. As long as they have not entered the coma stage and still have thoughts and feelings, health care workers should maintain and support their personal rights; such as retaining personal privacy and their own way of life, participating in the development of medical care programs, choosing the way of death, etc.  3.Improve the quality of life at the end of life Dying is also life, a special type of life, so correctly understanding and respecting the value of the patient’s last life and improving its quality of life is the most effective service for terminal patients.  4. Facing death together There is life and there is death. Death, like birth, is a natural law of the objective world that cannot be violated and is a fact that everyone has to experience.  The concept of hospice care entered China in the 1980s, and in 1988, the first hospice research institution in China, the Hospice Research Center of Tianjin Medical College, was established. Currently, there are about 100 hospice care institutions in China.  Scholars in Hong Kong refer to hospice care as “hospice service” and in Taiwan it is called “hospice care”. In Hong Kong, hospice nurses are called “handshake nurses” and “handshake girls”, and they are highly respected by the public.