Odyssey Healthcare

At Odyssey Hospice, we improve the quality of life for patients facing terminal diagnoses while providing support for their loved ones.

We've been meeting this special need since 1996. Odyssey is one of the largest hospice providers in the country, offering personalized care and support to thousands of patients and their families across the country each day.

Our teams of caregivers consist of registered nurses, physicians, home healthcare aides, social workers, chaplains, bereavement counselors and trained volunteers. They provide palliative care to ease pain and discomforting symptoms. In addition, they provide psycho-social and spiritual support for both patients and their loved ones. Patients typically receive our services in their own homes, in nursing homes, or assisted living facilities. We also serve patients in hospitals and, in certain geographic locations, in Odyssey's own freestanding hospice facilities.

The commitment and spirit of Odyssey team members who provide care and support 24 hours a day/seven days a week is embodied in a simple phrase team members wear on their collars: “YCCOM: You Can Count on Me.” Visit the Our Services web page for more information.

Hospice is not a place; it’s a philosophy of care that enhances life as it nears its end for the patients and their families and friends. Even when medicine cannot provide a cure, it can offer comfort, care and assistance that can help maintain a better quality of life for the patient. This type of attention, called palliative care, involves the aggressive treatment of physical and emotional pain and symptoms. It focuses on enhancing a patient’s comfort and improving quality of life.

Hospice is based on the belief that through sensitive, appropriate care and the support of a caring community, terminally ill patients and their families can begin to prepare to face the inevitable challenges ahead. Centuries ago, a hospice was a shelter for travelers. Over the years, it evolved into a refuge where people could find care, comfort and support during difficult times in their journey through life.

When a patient's physician certifies that hospice care is appropriate, one of Odyssey Hospice's nurses will admit the patient to our program within three hours – 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

The nurse and an Odyssey affiliated physician, who specialize in understanding and treating pain, will develop a plan of care to ease the patient's discomforting symptoms. Under Medicare, Medicaid and most insurance programs, Odyssey will provide medical supplies and equipment associated with the terminal illness, such as bandages, catheters, oxygen, hospital bed, wheelchair and walkers, at no cost to the patient. Odyssey will also provide medications associated with the terminal illness to help relieve symptoms at no cost to the patient.

Each patient and family has an Odyssey Hospice interdisciplinary team and the patient’s physician dedicated to providing a high-level of care and assistance to patients and their families.

The manager of Odyssey’s interdisciplinary team is the nurse who assesses the needs of the patient and family and develops a specific plan of care with the physician. The nurse manager coordinates care with others on the team and the patient’s physician, works with Odyssey’s medical director to assure that the symptoms are controlled and pain is managed and keeps the patient and family informed. In addition to the nurse case manager and the medical director, Odyssey’s interdisciplinary team includes:

• A home healthcare aide who is specially trained to work with the terminally ill and who will provide direct patient care such as dressing and personal hygiene;
• A chaplain who addresses the spiritual concerns of patients and family members within each patient’s individual belief system, as well as addressing concerns of a more generalized spiritual nature;
• A social worker who helps with a wide variety of psycho-social needs of patients and families ranging from financial considerations to dealing with grief and the loss of a loved one or accessing various community agencies for additional support programs; and
• Trained volunteers who provide companionship and non-medical services for the patient, respite time for the family and support at the time of death and during bereavement.

An on-call nursing team is always available after hours and on weekends for visits or phone consultation. Other specialists, such as nutritionists and physical, speech or occupational therapists, may be added to a patient’s team as needed.