Hospitality

We guarantee the presence three times a week of a nurse care manager of the House, at the Arcispedale S. Maria Nuova of Reggio Emilia next to the Single Access Point of the AUSL.

Monday – Wednesday – Friday 8.30 / 13.30.

This service facilitates the contact between patients / family and hospice before the actual entrance and, therefore, a gradual approach to our reality. When waiting times are prolonged, then there is the possibility of starting to offer an informative and emotional support, useful to lay some groundwork for the subsequent taking into care and therapeutic alliance.

The service continuity service answers the numbers 0522/295275 – 338/8876582.

Patients can be included in the list by:

• Family doctors
• Hospital doctors
• Family nurses
• Relatives.

Admittance procedure:

• It is necessary to fix an appointment with the Coordinator or the Social Assistant for a preliminary interview and a visit of the House;
• It is necessary to fax the assistance form filled in by a family doctor for home patients or by the doctor of the structure having previously called the Coordinator or the Social Assistant;
• Possible insertion in the waiting list.
• Admission request must be authorized by the Manager of the “Centro Unico di Cure Domiciliari” of the residential Sanitary District of Reggio Emilia AUSL.

Once patients are considered eligible, they enter a waiting list according to these fundamental factors :

• Home patients come before patients in hospital or other local structures;
• Serious uncontrollable symptoms, first of all pain;
• The age of patients , with priority to young ones. In a family with a young oncological patient, the experience is very traumatic and requires large support, particularly psychological, in order to avoid pathological mourning;
• Patients without family support come first;
• Patients in financial need come first;
• On account of worsening clinical conditions former patients are easily admitted again
  Priority is given to residents in the province of Reggio Emilia compared to non-residents.

Admission to Hospice is not permanent, but temporary. A 25-30 percentage of patients are discharged in stabilized conditions.

• For treatment and/or difficult home-control of symptoms , the period in Hospice can be up to 4 weeks. Pathology, symptoms and their possible evolution will be taken into consideration.
• Admissions for family relief may last from 20 days up to a maximum of one month in situations that comply with our eligibility criteria.
• Family relief periods can be repeated if recurrent situations are consistent with entry conditions and in accordance with the criteria of the waiting list.

If a patient returns home, he/she can be accepted again with facilitated procedure and in compliance with the waiting list rules.

At the end of their stay, patients are kindly requested to anonymously fill in an appreciation questionnaire about the service. The questionnaire is to be posted into a box located in the entrance hall. Copies of certificates and medical records may be requested from our offices according to the appropriate procedure.

The Hospice is open, for family visits, from 7:00 am to 08:00 pm.

The offices of the Administration are open from Monday to Friday from 8.30am to 12.30pm and from 2.30pm to 05:00pm. On Saturday from 09:00am to 12:00pm.

Welcoming and multidisciplinary assistance

Patients can be helped by a family member night and day as there is a sofa-bed in every room . Patients can take items they like in order to be comfortable in their rooms. Small pets are allowed after permission from the manager. DVD reader and headphones for TV or music are available on request. The family can buy meal vouchers from the reception.

Free assistance to patients includes:

• Accurate monitoring of each symptom, especially pain;
• Personalized treatment, carried out by a multidisciplinary team made up of palliative care doctors, nurses, health workers, psychologists, physiotherapists, shiatsu and music therapists, religious ministers.

At the end of the hospitalization, it is kindly requested to fill in the service evaluation questionnaire, anonymously.

The questionnaire will be deposited in the appropriate box located in the entrance hall.

At the offices of the Administration, you will be able to request hospitalization certificates and a copy of the clinical-health record according to the specific procedure.

The Service is accredited by the Health Agency of Emilia Romagna (Det.ne n. 19278 del 20.11.2018).

The continuous improvement in the quality of our service is guaranteed not only by the high professional standards of the operators, but also by a thorough development of the internal Quality System, according to regional indications.
The main objective of the team’s work is the achievement of the best quality of life, as allowed by the disease. For this purpose the team periodically meets to evaluate the achievement of this goal. Furthermore, patients are encouraged to fill in a questionnaire evaluating the perceived quality of life (POS – Palliative Care Outcome Scale).

Comfort and personalized care for patients and families

Particular attention is paid to some key moments:

• Reception;
• Assistance planning;
• Possible protected discharge;
• Mourning care;

On reception and within 48 hours after arrival the patient is informed about the running of the House and as much information as possible is collected to draw a personal care plan. A week since admission and approximately twenty days later there will be a meeting with members of the family and the multidisciplinary team of the House (including the doctor in charge of treatment, nurse and psychologist) for an overall evaluation of care problems (each operator is in any case bound to listen and counsel patient and family).

On discharge all services of the local network are activated in order to ensure care continuity. A care continuity report with the most relevant clinical issues is drawn up for the medical general practitioner and/or the home nursing service. If faced with a mourning process, the family can ask the team of psychologists for individual meetings as a support.