Levels of Care

Routine Care: Care that is provided regularly by the hospice team members in the patient's or family's home, assisted living or skilled nursing facility. Our routine care works on a schedule that is set between patients and families along with the Dunes Hospice team. The number one goal of our routine services is to provide the best quality service and satisfying our patients, along with their families, as much as possible.

General Inpatient Care (GIP): Care that is provided at a Medicare Certified Facility for patients who need pain control or acute symptom management that cannot be managed in their current setting.  The length of stay for inpatient level of care will be determined by the Dunes Hospice Team.

Inpatient Respite Care: Respite care is short-term inpatient care provided to the individual when necessary to relieve the family members or other persons caring for the individual at home. Respite care may not be reimbursed for more than five consecutive days at a time, including the date of admission but not including the date of discharge.  Respite care is provided in Medicare-certified nursing facilities who can provide 24-hour nursing if the patient’s plan of care required that type of nursing intervention. 

Continuous Home Care: Care to be provided only during periods of crisis to maintain the patient at home. Criteria for continuous home care are the same as general inpatient care. Hospice staff will provide a minimum of eight hours of care per day.  The length of stay for inpatient level of care will be determined by the Dunes Hospice Team.

Hospice Services

Our services enable the patient to stay in the comfort of their own "home" environment, whether that be a private home, assisted living or a long-term care facility. The Dunes Hospice team makes regularly scheduled visits to ensure quality care to maintain comfort and dignity during the end-of-life journey.

Our dedicated team of physicians, licensed nurses, certified assistants. social workers, chaplains and registered dietitians work in collaboration with the patient and family to develop an individualized plan of care centered around the patient's wishes. We base this plan of care around identified problems, needs, goals, physician orders for medications, treatments, care, your environment and personal wishes whenever possible. Effective pain management is an important part of your treatment plan.

The plan includes five basic areas:

  • Physical and Personal Care

  • Comfort Care

  • Spiritual Support

  • Psycho social Needs

  • Bereavement Care

We encourage family and patient participation when developing and revising the plan of care.  The plan of care is reviewed and updated every 15 days with our hospice team.  

Pharmacy Services

Dunes Hospice takes pride in ensuring our patient's medications are readily available upon admission to hospice services and throughout their hospice journey. We partner with locally owned Gil Pharmacy to provide high quality delivery and service to our community. We also employ our own consultant pharmacist to audit patient’s medication regimen and make recommendations as deemed necessary.

Gil Pharmacy specializes in hospice care to provide comfort medications in individual doses with ease of administration. Gil Drugs will provide door-to-door delivery to allow patients and families to spend quality time together.