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HOSPICE PARTNERS WITH TOGUS, MAINE VA CENTER --

"It's an approach to care for folks who have an illness

or a condition that is probably not curable."

 

Jim Robertson, of Winslow, a volunteer with Hospice
Volunteers of Waterville Area, wheels Al Tibbetts back to his
room at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center. (photo:
Blethen Maine News Service by Andy Molloy)

 

Story here... http://pressherald.mainetoday.com/
news/state/070108hospice.html

Story below:

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Hospice partners up with Togus VA Center

By DOUG HARLOW
Blethen Maine News Service
Portland Press Herald

TOGUS - They sit by the window on a sunny Thursday afternoon, just two guys talking -- one a retired police officer and hospice volunteer, the other a U.S. military veteran with end-stage cancer.

The winter trees are bare outside the window of the nursing home care unit at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center. A small American flag flutters from the outdoor gazebo, and a Christmas wreath hangs at the entrance of the stately brick building.

"When I came over here (to the medical center) it was not done with ease," Albert Tibbetts, 74, of Oakland tells Jim Robertson of Winslow, a volunteer with Hospice Volunteers of Waterville Area.

"It was done with tears."

Tibbetts, a veteran of the U.S. Air Force during the Korean War, has prostate cancer. He has lived at the VA's nursing home since just before Thanksgiving.

Robertson, who retired from the Waterville Police Department in 1995, was on his second visit Thursday as part of a new hospice partnership with the Togus VA center.

The program in Maine is the first in New England and the second in the nation.

Officials at the VA hospital in Boston think the collaboration is a good idea, too, and have requested more information on the Maine plan for implementation in that region. The VA Boston Healthcare System, the largest consolidated facility in the region, encompasses nine campuses within a 40-mile radius of the greater Boston area.

The program at Togus brings hospice volunteers from the Waterville office into the VA nursing home. Veterans received hospice care before now, said John McEwan, manager for geriatrics and extended care at the home, but usually in the community, in their homes, not in the medical center setting.

"People tend to be very passionate about hospice care," McEwan said. "I believe that the patients have gotten good care in the past, but this is an added dimension that we really feel will enhance the quality of care that we are able to provide. It's an approach to care for folks who have an illness or a condition that is probably not curable; it's something they are going to have to learn to live with."

McEwan said that by using the Waterville agency, the whole approach to care focuses more on making sure the veteran is comfortable and has a good quality of life, emotional support and is able to do things and see people.

Tibbetts said that is his situation as he fights the cancer inside him.

Volunteers were not available to every patient before the agreement with the Waterville hospice. Now they have become the "eyes and ears" of hospice, said Hospice Executive Director Dale Marie Clark.

"They spend anywhere between two to four hours a week, one on one, with that person," Clark said. "They oftentimes will see and hear and experience other pieces of the person. They (the veterans) usually are taken care of by women, so they miss that male companionship, and that oftentimes fills a void at the end of life as well."

From his wheelchair at the window, Tibbetts said he has 12 children from two marriages, six of whom are his biological children. He said his wives have died and many of the children have moved away.

It gets lonely, Tibbetts said, and hospice is helping already.

One of his daughters, Debra Sills of Oakland, tends to his needs regularly. Sills said she visits her dad every other day, and that the hospice program could go a long way to filling in the gaps of loneliness when she cannot be there.

"I think it's a wonderful program. My suggestion when my father first went in was that he should speak with someone other than me and release issues he does not talk to me about," Sills said. "He seems to have hit it off with the volunteer he has and he has the opportunity to speak with another man.

"It was a difficult move. It's been a big adjustment for everyone. I hope the program does well for other patients as it has for my dad."

Robertson, 62, said he signed up to be a volunteer for Hospice for the same reason he was a police officer for 27 years -- to help people. This new program fits the bill, he said.

"We're just getting to know Al at this point, we're sitting down talking about his family and his life history; what he's done and where he's been, getting to know him so we can get into any other issues later," Robertson said.

"With hospice, you get invited into other people's lives at a very difficult time and sometimes you are able to help them and their loved ones," he said.

 

HOSPICE VITALS

NAME: Hospice Volunteers of Waterville Area

FOUNDED: 1980

SERVES: 24 communities

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR: Dale Marie Clark, 58, of Vassalboro

MISSION: Provides nonmedical support, companionship and emotional support to dying people and their families and bereavement support services to those who lose a loved one.

STAFF: Five part-time staff and 150 volunteers.

FUNDING: $205,000 budget, funding through fundraising events, annual appeals, memorial donations and grants; services for veterans and others are free.

CONTACT: 873-3615 or write to Hospice Volunteers of Waterville Area, 304 Main St., Waterville, ME 04903, or on the Web at www.hvwa.org

 
HOSPICE AND THE VA

Hospice Volunteers of Waterville Area is the "go to" agency for improving end-of-life care for veterans through the national Hospice Veterans Partnership and in Maine in collaboration with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Togus.

Florida was the first to establish a collaboration with community Hospice agencies. Maine was the second and the first in New England. The Waterville group trains the volunteers and staffs the programs, which serve veterans from all over the state.

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Larry Scott

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