Mother was dehydrated & almost killed by hospice.

[Yescat]

My mother signed herself into Heartland Hospice care last week with the hopes they would, “make her more comfortable with better pain medications.” The day before she signed she was her old self. Just fine. Within two days she was in grave condition and I was getting calls to make funeral arrangements for her. I started to question the director of the hospice and found out that they were drugging her with methadone and not feeding her or giving her water or IV. In other words they were trying the euthanize her. They refused to put her on IV or call the paramedics. I ultimately had to run down to Manor Pines, sign her out of hospice and call 911. The paramedics took her to Holy Cross in critical condition in renal shutdown due to dehydration. Ever since they have been trying to get her kidneys working. On 10/25 they called me and told me she had an infarction and after being worked on extensively to revive her she was declared dead. A half hour later the doctor calls me and tells me she came back to life while being prepared for the morgue! So she’s still alive and at Holy Cross CCU. She’s presently on hemodialisis and a respirator and is not conscious.

My mother’s doctors are trying very hard to get me to withdraw her from life support. I feel it's too soon.

1) Are they trying to aviod a wrongful death lawsuit by getting me to "pull the plug?"

2) If she dies should I call for a private wrongful death autopsy? Will the medical examiners office step in if I ask them to?

 

[ecmst12]

Do you understand what hospice means? Do you understand what they do? They are not going to do any medical intervention. They are not going to try to prolong her life. They are not going to force her to eat or drink if she does not want to. They are going to try to make her comfortable because she is dying. And that is what she wanted! And you have her hooked up to machines and keeping her body alive which is probably completely the opposite of what she wanted. You need to reconsider your motivations here.

 

[swalsh411]

I'm sure this is a stressful time here and it's hard for you not to be emotional when it's your mother but please take a step back and try to look at this objectively.

How exactly do you think people die in hospice? Renal failure is a very common cause of death. She may have chosen not to drink enough water.

Why are you keeping your mother alive at this point? She checked herself into hospice afterall. When will it no longer be "too soon"? When your mother has been a vegetable for weeks? Months? How much money do you think she would want to be spent keeping her alive like this?

 

[CJane]

My mother signed herself into Heartland Hospice care last week with the hopes they would, “make her more comfortable with better pain medications.”

Why did your mother sign herself into hospice care if she wasn't terminally ill?

Do you, instead, mean that she moved into a skilled nursing facility that happens to have hospice care?

What did your mother need pain management FOR?

Did your mother have a care plan? Did your mother have a DNR order?

 

[Yescat]

She was already in a skilled care facility. She had back pain from a deteriorating disk. She wasn't terminal. She had abulatory problems from a stroke and was on typical heart disease and depression medications. She had no care plan or DNR.

 

[Antigone*]

She was already in a skilled care facility. She had back pain from a deteriorating disk. She wasn't terminal. She had abulatory problems from a stroke and was on typical heart disease and depression medications. She had no care plan or DNR.

Why did she check herself into hospice care? If she was not terminal, then it does not make sense.

 

[tranquility]

She wasn't terminal

First, I'm sorry for the extreme events in your life of late.

Second, as a matter of fact, we're ALL terminal.

Third, and where my difficulty lies, hospice is usually reserved for extra assistance for terminally ill people. To pay for that extra, most insurance and medicare have guidelines for what terminally ill means. I'd like to know more facts on how mom got in the program before saying more.

 

[ecmst12]

A hospice will not accept a patient if they have not been given 6 months or less to live, it is ONLY for terminal patients.

A hospice service CAN provide care to someone living in a nursing home, or at the patient's home, or at the hospice's own inpatient facility.

 

[IThirst]

My experience

Within two days she was in grave condition and I was getting calls to make funeral arrangements for her.

Once someone in Hospice becomes ill, it seems like any further palliative care is withdrawn; they're not looking at an illness; it's automatically considered "the end".
UTI & dehydration & unresponsiveness = no IVs - never mind that UTIs and dehydration have a tendency to make one unresponsive. They assume it's the body stopping functioning when it just could be the UTI. No, she doesn't want to eat. A UTI can do that. She's not having lung problems - the truth is, they don't know that an IV wouldn't improve her mental status. Being dehydrated cannot be comfortable; the dehydration shuts down the kidneys and causes arrhythmias just as much as injecting a drug to cause them would. And they have the cart before the horse. They say dehydration is the body's way of shutting down, but it's the dehydration that shuts down the kidneys.
Hospice seems to be quickly becoming a euthanasia service via dehydration. When I signed the hospice papers as her POA, I did not agree to euthanasia.

 

[Yescat]

Once someone in Hospice becomes ill, it seems like any further palliative care is withdrawn; they're not looking at an illness; it's automatically considered "the end".
UTI & dehydration & unresponsiveness = no IVs - never mind that UTIs and dehydration have a tendency to make one unresponsive. They assume it's the body stopping functioning when it just could be the UTI. No, she doesn't want to eat. A UTI can do that. She's not having lung problems - the truth is, they don't know that an IV wouldn't improve her mental status. Being dehydrated cannot be comfortable; the dehydration shuts down the kidneys and causes arrhythmias just as much as injecting a drug to cause them would. And they have the cart before the horse. They say dehydration is the body's way of shutting down, but it's the dehydration that shuts down the kidneys.
Hospice seems to be quickly becoming a euthanasia service via dehydration. When I signed the hospice papers as her POA, I did not agree to euthanasia.

She signed into hospice with the promise she would get better pain medication. Her doctor even admitted in court that to get a patient "comfort care" they have to declare the patient terminal. But she didn't get what I would call comfort care. What she got was 30mg of methadone every two hours until she was in critical condition. I checked her into the hospital but she eventually died after her kidneys failed completely. But I don't believe for a second she wanted to die. In the hospital she clung to life. Around a week after she was admitted to the hospital they unsuccessfully tried to resuscitate her, declared her dead, removed all life support and prepared her for the morgue. The person who was preparing her noticed she was breathing again! So I get a call telling me my mother had died, then a half hour later another call telling me she was alive again! She lived another week.

 

[I'mTheFather]

She signed into hospice with the promise she would get better pain medication. Her doctor even admitted in court that to get a patient "comfort care" they have to declare the patient terminal. But she didn't get what I would call comfort care. What she got was 30mg of methadone every two hours until she was in critical condition. I checked her into the hospital but she eventually died after her kidneys failed completely. But I don't believe for a second she wanted to die. In the hospital she clung to life. Around a week after she was admitted to the hospital they unsuccessfully tried to resuscitate her, declared her dead, removed all life support and prepared her for the morgue. The person who was preparing her noticed she was breathing again! So I get a call telling me my mother had died, then a half hour later another call telling me she was alive again! She lived another week.

So, you've been to court. What was the outcome?

 

[Yescat]

So, you've been to court. What was the outcome?

The case wasn't against the hospice. It was a case against the device manufacturer which gave her the stroke which put her in the home in the first place. We lost even though the manufacturer admitted to illegal marketing to doctors. The lawyers didn't want to sue the hospice even though I thought they should.

 

[>Charlotte<]

Just one quick note to point out that hospice actually isn't just for terminally ill patients. Not all hospice patients are dying.

 

[ecmst12]

Again - a hospice program will not accept a patient that has not been declared terminal by their doctor. If the doctor lies, that's a whole other ball of wax, but hospice is by definition for terminal patients.

 

[>Charlotte<]

I'm a hospice patient and I'm not dying. Because of the nature of their work with terminally ill patients, hospice careworkers have a unique expertise in treating the effects of disease even though they don’t actually treat the disease. That’s why they are an excellent resource for people who are dealing with the side effects of, for instance, cancer treatment. They are helping me manage the effects of chemo and radiation. Mostly the radiation. When I started having some unusual problems and my oncologist was running out of ideas he suggested hospice might have a few tricks up their sleeve, and they certainly did. Although their primary purpose is to help terminal patients they are available for people like me.

Now, as far as Yescat's mom is concerned, it seems that she was terminal. I just wanted to correct the idea that hospice is absolutely only for patients who are terminal.