Unfortunately not all diseases can be cured. That’s why it is pointless for many patients to stay in a hospital after doctor has announced the verdict. At the same time very often they cannot come back home because medical care they constantly need is difficult to be provided by family and relatives. Since being established in 1970 hospices take care for many thousand patients yearly.
Statistics for 2010 says that approximately 1.581 million patients received services from hospice; nearly 49.9 percents of all deaths in the country were under the care of a hospice program; and the percentage of hospice patients receiving care in hospice inpatient institutions was 21.9 percents (Girillo, 2010). On the base of above mentioned facts one can conclude the following: hospice service programs are in-demand, and the number of hospice units in inpatient institutions is relatively small. It means that economical niche for this type of service still has vacant places to be occupied.
I suggest establishing hospice unit in LTC with working potential approximately 300-350 patients per year. Up to 30 patients will get care simultaneously. Supporting therapy, special dietary schemes and schedules, general medical and psychological care are core services in this hospice unit. There are a lot of residents with special care needs; some of them have to be looked after 24 hours a day when others may have a very complicated treatment regime. The needs of such patients’ categories will be satisfied as well. As an additional advantage, I also recommend organizing special psychological trainings or courses for relatives as very often they suffer even more than patients. This program will help people not only to resolve own inner problems and stay calm in difficult situations, but also provide others with psychological support.
Economical aspects of every business plan can be divided into two groups: those that form expenses, and those that are responsible for income. The hospice room and pain-relieving palliative care cost only about $400 a day, while the average hospital stay costs HYPERLINK "http://topics.nytimes.com/top/news/health/diseasesconditionsandhealthto pics/medicare/index.html?inline=nyt-classifier" Medicare over $6,000 a day (Jacoby, 2012). The case was about 89-year-old woman suffering multiple generative diseases. As far as more than 80 percents of hospice patients are 65 years of age or older – and more than one-third of all hospice patients are 85 years of age or older (Antony Girillo, Hospice Facts and Stats), we can say that $400 is an average cost for one day spent in hospice. Judging from this we can calculate the sum per patient per month that makes 12.000 of income, and if we have 30 patients per month the final sum is 144.000. Psychological trainings for relatives that can be taken either in groups or on individual basis will add a reasonable amount of money to the total.
Speaking about expenses they will include the price of furniture and equipment, food, medications and staff salary. Furniture and equipments costs are primary costs that do not belong to regular expenses, because they are renewed or substituted only …