The Dignity of Life A Visit to Hospice in Taiwan The Mother of Hospice in England, Cecily Sanders, said this. Dr. Cecilia Sanders said this: You are important because you are you. Even to your last breath, you are still important! We will do everything we can to help you pass away peacefully. But we will also do everything we can to keep you alive until the very end. This passage accurately illustrates the self-care quote of hospice care. Dr. Hsu Li-an, director of the Taiwan Hospice Association, compares the hospice wards in Taiwan to “a rest stop to face death positively and see the truth of life”, where even in the face of limited time, one can still truly respect life and let it shine and glow until the last moment. There is a proverb that has remained true for centuries: “Sometimes there is a complete cure, usually there is relief from pain, and always there is comfort. This was also the wish of David, a terminal cancer patient, when he donated £500 to Dr. Sanders, the mother of hospice care in England, and gave people a glimpse of the last hope for the lives of terminally ill patients. When I visited the Heart Lotus Ward at Tzu Chi Hospital in Hualien, Taiwan, I understood that the meaning of the Heart Lotus Ward is: the heart is developed like a lotus flower. I hope that patients can face illness and life with dignity here. There is a couplet at the entrance of the ward, which reads: The heart is like the bright moon, shining through the purity of the earth; the lotus is like bodhi, blooming with wisdom flowers on earth. It is also hoped that patients can truly understand that although life is limited, wisdom life is infinite. On the wall of the ward, there is a picture of “nine lotus flowers transforming into Buddha”, which is Mr. Xie Kunshan’s creation. It is inspired by Buddhist scriptures: when one is dying, if one can seek birth in the Western bliss world, one will be born on a lotus flower, and the flower will blossom to see Buddha and hear Buddha’s words. This is the direction that Buddhists strive for in all their lives. In his book “Stories from the Heart Lotus Ward,” Dr. Hsu Lai-on recounts various death scenes to give readers an understanding of the dignity of life. He says, “Every patient is my teacher as well as my friend, and it is from the patient that I learn about death.” When we come to visit the Heart Lotus ward, we should not only see the beautiful hardware and equipment of the ward, but also appreciate its connotation: to think about the patient’s or family’s needs from their standpoint, and to find ways to meet their wishes. This is also the purpose of hospice care. The main contents include: 1) Disease control: including pain, dyspnea, nausea, vomiting, intestinal obstruction and other common terminal symptoms of appropriate treatment. 2) Physical care of the patient. 3) Psychosocial counseling and care of the patient and family. 4) Spiritual and religious needs of the patient and family. 5) Death preparation. 6) Grief counseling and follow-up of the family after the death of the patient. Treatment methods include oral and injectable medications to relieve pain, and social, psychological, and spiritual treatment and care. The goal is to improve the quality of life of the patient before death. Psychologists usually provide spiritual care, while social workers use social resources, work with volunteers, or assist patients with financial problems. Spiritual care for patients and families belongs to the caregivers, non-Christian hospitals by volunteers, Christian hospitals by chaplains or evangelists. In addition to alleviating the suffering of the patients, the psychological trauma and pain of the families can also be alleviated, and the patients can pass away more peacefully and with dignity than before. The Heart Lotus ward has sent more than 1,000 patients away in five years, while a major earthquake took thousands of lives overnight, and more than 5,000 people died on September 11 in the U.S. Natural and man-made disasters take lives faster and more often than illnesses, and there is no opportunity to prepare for death. The meaning of life is to find the true direction and goal, and to make the world a better place by doing one’s best! Life should be like this: “The mountain does not turn to the road, the road does not turn to the people, the people do not turn to the heart”. The oyster can turn the torture of the sand into a pearl, and although the lotus heart is bitter, the lotus can still open out of the sludge, so why can’t we turn the shadow of death into a million rays of life!