The Wisdom of Home Hospice

Cancer Care Home Hospice Inc.
Bundeena NSW Australia
www.homehospice.com.au
Email: manionha@netspace.net.au

Home Hospice is a non-profit organisation and Registered Charity. It was established by Dr Helen-Anne Manion, a Medical Oncologist, and Gerard Manion, a Counsellor. Home Hospice evolved out of the Manions’ work with cancer patients over many years in their Cancer Care Programme.

Gerry and Helen-Anne were frequently asked by families to support them in granting the wish of their loved one to die at home. From these experiences, they became aware of the loss to the community that took place when dying became institutionalised. Excerpts from Gerard Manion’s writings:

… dying has been medicalised and institutionalised to the point where it’s a rare exception for someone to remain at home to die. Most people assume the normal thing, the necessary thing, is for the dying person ultimately to be hospitalised. The result of hospitalisation is that the dying patient becomes marginalised. Institutions are not as welcoming of visitors as home is, and those who do visit are there on the institution’s terms, albeit as generous and relaxed as they sometimes may be. But privacy suffers and, therefore, communication. Intimacy is difficult with people coming and going. So, while efforts are directed largely at the comfort of the body, the person (soul, heart, mind, emotions) is not as well nurtured as it would be in the comfort and privacy of home. Even the comfort of the body is not what it would be were they are home. Patients dying at home are found to require less pain medication, have fewer side effects from their medication, relax more easily, sleep better.

Description

Home Hospice trains and provides volunteer co-ordinators to meet with the patient, their family and friends to organise practical help and support for the carer and family so that their time and energies can be focused on being with, caring for, and providing the best possible quality of life for their family member who is dying. All time is given voluntarily and families receiving help from Home Hospice do not pay for this service. The contact between families and Home Hospice continues for up to 13 months after the death of the family member.

Philosophy

The work of Home Hospice is founded on carefully thought-out philosophies of the symbolic meaning of home, community, human dignity, and death as an important stage of life.

Home Hospice works on a number of levels from the practical care given in providing for a family to have meals cooked for them or to have a friend sit with the patient, education of General Practitioners, through to being an agent for change across society. Excerpt from the Director’s Report 1998-1999:

… we now focus primarily on the educational aspect of our mission as a catalyst for change - a change in the mindset of the general community from one that believes the preference to die at home is but an impractical wish to one that sees quite clearly it can so often be made possible.

The major focus…is the establishing of a sound educational plan directed to the people about their rights and the Home Hospice way of caring, and also to provide GPs with education and understanding of Home Hospice support.

Contact

Contact with Home Hospice can be made by emailing manionha@netspace.net.au.

Website: www.homehospice.com.au

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