Solomon Valley Hospice

Solomon Valley Hospice offers a comprehensive program of care to patients and families facing a life threatening illness (not just cancer) with a prognosis of 6 months or less to live. Hospice is primarily a concept of care, not a specific place of care. Hospice emphasizes palliative and comfort care than curative care, and the patient is no longer seeking aggressive treatment for their disease process.

Introduction to Hospice

Hospice care should be considered when a patient has a life-limiting illness that is progressing despite standard treatments. When considering hospice care, one must understand that hospice provides physical, emotional, and spiritual support, emphasizing the relief of pain and other distressing symptoms.

Hospice care is covered by Medicare, by Medicaid in Kansas and by most private insurance benefits. For the uninsured or those who do not have the ability to pay, Solomon Valley Hospice provides financial assistance for hospice services through memorials and donations given to the organization to help those in need.

The decision to choose hospice care can be difficult as the patient and family need to accept the shift in focus from curative to comfort. Unfortunately, the most common regret of hospice families is waiting until it is almost too late to take advantage of the benefits hospice care brings.

Why Choose Hospice Care?

Hospice offers support and encouragement that all patients and families deserve during the final months of life. A team of nurses, home health aides, physicians, pastoral care staff, social workers and trained volunteers provides the hospice care. And, along with caring for patients, these individuals make home visits, provide respite for caregivers, and coordinate community services by listening and responding to the needs of the patient and family.

In caring for the loved one, the hospice team recognizes that the family often knows best regarding what will make the patient comfortable. These hospice workers acknowledge the courage it takes to care for a loved one who is dying.

The patient's primary physician continues to oversee daily care whether the patient is at home, the home of a loved one or in a long-term care facility. Hospice also provides medical equipment such as a hospital bed, commode, and oxygen, along with supplies and prescribed medications for pain and symptom relief. It also covers outpatient treatments and short-term hospital care, which may be needed when symptoms cannot be managed at home.

Who Benefits from Hospice Care?

Hospice is unique in that it includes support for a patient's family during the illness as well as for a year after the patient's death. Although the disease and its symptoms happen to the patient, the illness affects the entire family. Facing illness and death as a family can help to make this time easier, though not all families can be open to share their feelings.

A loved one's terminal illness presents a time of uncertainty and emotional vulnerability. The patient may be resigned to the reality of his or her impending death, and family members may feel angry, thinking their loved one has given up. This anger often is a result of frustration or sorrow. A family member may find it is easier to share these feelings with outside sources, such as a nurse, counselor, clergy, trusted friend or hospice team member, who can encourage family members to talk, listen, and help one another.

Children have special needs in dealing with the impending death of someone they love. Depending on their age and stage of development, death may have different meanings for children. Hospice provides help in answering children's questions honestly at an appropriate level, and it offers bereavement programs that support the whole family in dealing with the emotional and spiritual issues of their loss.

The best time to learn about hospice is before it is needed. The earlier hospice is involved, the more it can make the patient's final days, weeks, and months as comfortable and satisfying as possible. Many surviving family members say, "I do not know what I would have done without hospice."

Choosing Hospice

All hospices are not the same and choosing a hospice is a personal decision. Whether you are looking for hospice care for yourself or a loved one, it is important to find out about what services each hospice in your area offers. You may want to request services from a particular hospice and can communicate that wish to your physician.
Hospice care is a philosophy of care that accepts dying as a natural part of life. When death is inevitable, hospice seeks neither to hasten nor postpone it.

Why Choose Solomon Valley Hospice?

Solomon Valley Hospice has served as a non-profit, community-based organization for more than 30 years and offers the following benefits to Patients and Families:
A full care team including doctors, nurses, social workers, chaplains, volunteers, bereavement services and therapists.
Enhanced interventions to address the needs of the actively dying patient and family by increased use of social workers and specially trained volunteers.
We also offer a specialty service which integrates massage therapy into the patient's Care Plan, if they choose. Massage Therapy has proven to relieve stress, anxiety and pain.

Contact Solomon Valley Hospice to inquire about the admissions process.

Whether you are facing a terminal illness, are looking for more information, or would like to find out more about setting up an admissions visit, we are always ready to help.

Please call us at (785) 738-9260 for more details regarding Solomon Valley Hospice. Our hours are Monday - Friday, 8:00 am to 4:30 pm, with a registered nurse on-call 24/7.

Useful Sites

National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization: www.nhpco.org

Contact Information

Mary Prochaska, Director
311 W. Main Street, P.O. Box 399
Beloit, KS 67420
785-738-9260
Fax: 785-534-1332
E-mail: mprochaska@mchks.com