Patients undergoing treatment for serious illnesses and injuries often deal with unpleasant side effects and frequent trips to the hospital due to complications. If your loved one is battling a serious or life-limiting condition, they may benefit from palliative or hospice care. These services provide additional support and medical care to help improve the patient’s quality of life as they cope with their illness.

When Palliative Care is Best

Palliative care provides comfort and support to patients undergoing treatments for serious or chronic conditions such as cancer, COPD, chronic kidney disease, or congestive heart failure. It’s designed to work alongside your treatment plan and help alleviate negative side effects caused by the treatment, including pain management.

Affinity Care of New Jersey’s palliative care services provide

Ongoing coordination with your doctors to plan your care and treat your symptoms
In-person and phone consultations with nurses practitioners specialized in pain management
Around the clock access to patient triage every day of the week for emergency care
Home visits from social workers to coordinate and manage support services for the patient and caregiver
Spiritual and psychosocial support for the patient

Palliative care is designed to help you stay at home, so you don’t have to be hospitalized unnecessarily to treat your symptoms.

Palliative Care vs. Hospice Care

While palliative and hospice care provide similar services, they’re offered at different phases of your illness.

What is hospice care, and when should your loved one consider this option? Hospice care provides the same medical and support services as palliative care but is only administered to patients during the final phase of their life.

While palliative care provides services alongside treatment and can begin at the time of your diagnosis, hospice care starts only after a patient stops seeking treatment for their illness. The goals of the treatments are also different. While they both seek to provide relief from pain and unpleasant symptoms, palliative care can be used as part of a curative treatment. Hospice care only provides comfort and doesn’t intend to help cure your disease.

When to Transition to Hospice Care

Patients may decide to transition from palliative care to hospice care when their condition can no longer be improved through treatment. To be eligible for hospice care, patients must go through a certification process. In this process, two separate doctors must conclude that the patient is dealing with a terminal illness and has six months or less left to live if their disease runs its course.

Hospice care can be administered in a skilled nursing facility or a patient’s home, depending on the circumstances of the particular patient. Hospice care offers comfort for patients during the final phase of their illness.

Insurances Accepted

Affinity Care of New Jersey has agreements with most insurance providers to accept coverage for hospice and palliative care services. We accept Medicare and popular private insurances.

Locations Served

We offer hospice and palliative care services across selected locations in New Jersey. These areas include:

• Bergen County
• Camden County
• Essex County
• Mercer County
• Middlesex County
• Monmouth County
• Morris County
• Ocean County
• Passaic County
• Sussex County
• Union County

Contact us to learn more about our compassionate care services.