Literature Review

The Katherine House: Hospice care for homeless people coming to Dallas Dallas News, Dallas, TX; by Steve Hamm; 10/31/25 The $5 million project is scheduled to kick off renovations at the home in January 2026. A 1896 Victorian-style house in the Wilson Historic District will be converted into a hospice house, providing end-of-life care for homeless individuals in Dallas at no cost. The Visiting Nurse Association of Texas is a 91-year-old nonprofit organization that provides home-delivered meals free of charge to individuals unable to obtain or prepare their own meals and offers home health, hospice, and community health services. The association has partnered with The Meadows Foundation to bring the project to life. 

The secret to a successful AI rollout? It's all about timing - and these 5 factors ZDNET; by Mark Samuels; 11/3/25 AI rollouts fail 95% of the time. Here's how to get yours right. ... Five business leaders share their tips. ...

Hospice of the Valley launches support group for people with mild cognitive impairment Lovin' Life; by Lin Sue Flood; 11/2/25 Living with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) can be an isolating experience, but a new program from Hospice of the Valley offers a welcoming space for connection and support. GATHER is a peer-led group where individuals diagnosed with MCI can share their experiences, navigate emotions, and discover new coping strategies together. ... GATHER provides a safe environment for members to lead their own discussions. Unlike traditional support groups, members are empowered to guide conversations toward topics that are most relevant to them. This novel format models successful programs in Europe. 

Developing person-centred care in hospices through the voice and leadership of nursing: lessons from the United Kingdom Frontiers in Helath Services; by Erna Haraldsdottir, Marie Cooper, Heather Richardson; 10/15/25 Conclusion and implications for practice: Humanising healthcare is a global agenda, and within hospice care, nurses are at the heart of transforming care to be more person-centred. They are well-positioned to reclaim the core principles of palliative care, as developed by Cicely Saunders, and push back against the medical model that has overshadowed the development and integration of palliative care into current healthcare systems. Nurses are expert practitioners and leaders who hold positions of authority within their organisations. Yet, for many, their change-making potential is not realised. 

Ana Maria Rodriguez files a bill to better ensure patient choices are honored in end-of-life care Florida Politics; by Andrew Powell; 10/31/25 Sen. Ana Maria Rodriguez wants to make sure physicians follow directives from Florida patients who communicate and preauthorize end-of-life care preferences. Those can include pain management choices and interventions that artificially prolong the process of dying. The Doral Republican filed a bill (SB 312) that aims to establish and regulate “patient-directed medical orders” within Florida law, ensuring that patient preferences, such as withholding or withdrawing life-sustaining interventions, are honored and respected across health care settings.

VITAS and Miami Dade College partner to shape the next generation of compassionate nurses South Florida Hospital News and Healthcare Report; by Daniel Casciato; 11/1/25 For Miami Dade College (MDC) nursing students Khadijah Norelus and Shanel Cantave, the decision to pursue nursing came from deeply personal experiences. Shanel was inspired after nearly losing her father to a hemorrhagic stroke. Khadijah’s calling was born when she witnessed the care and compassion a hospice nurse gave her cousin in his final moments. Today, both women are VITAS Scholars—recipients of the Miami Dade College LPN Scholarship supported by hospice provider VITAS Healthcare—and represent the next generation of caregivers preparing to serve South Florida’s communities amid a national nursing shortage.

Essentia Health, Solvay staff reach contract deal Northern News Now, Duluth, MN; by Northern News Now staff; 10/30/25 Another agreement has been reached between Essentia and the Minnesota Nurses Association. On Wednesday [10/29], healthcare workers at the Solvay Hospice House finalized their first contract. As we reported, hundreds of MNA union members walked off the job in July. During the strike, care at the Solvay Hospice House was stopped. Solvay leaders made the decision to pause care saying the facility relies on Essentia Health’s nursing staff. Care started again at the end of July. On Wednesday [10/29], Essentia announced that a tentative three-year agreement has been reached with the Solvay team.

Bearing witness in home hospice: Ethical reflections on caring for Asian American patients American Journal of Hospice and Palliative Medicine; by Tuzhen Xu, PhD, APRN, FNP-C and Dan Song, PhD, RN This narrative aims to examine the ethical and cultural challenges faced by home hospice nurses when caring for Asian American patients in culturally diverse home-based environments. Drawing on personal experiences as a hospice nurse case manager and director, it explores how cultural practices such as avoiding direct discussions about death, prioritizing family-centered decision-making, and hesitating to use professional interpreters can conflict with hospice principles of patient autonomy and informed consent. 

Natalie’s Notes: Dad’s weekend needs events for grieving students The Post, Athens, OH; by Natalie Saddler; 10/31/25 This weekend is Ohio University’s Dads weekend, filled with events, ... throughout campus. Although many students enjoy these events, some students could be grieving a deceased loved one from afar, and this weekend may affect them negatively. ... However, the only hospice program in Athens doesn’t offer any support groups or community bereavement services. Many grieving Athens residents can’t access a proper support group, especially students with family members in hospice care. ... [A support event was created] through the Honoros Tutorial College called  AlternaDad’s.

The Alliance celebrates National Care at Home Month 2025 National Alliance for Care at Home, Alexandria, VA and Washington, DC; Press Release; 10/31/25November marks the start of National Care at Home Month, an annual observance created to honor the valuable contributions of home care providers nationwide and inspire outreach to communities, media, and policymakers. ... The Alliance encourages individuals and organizations to participate in its annual Social Media Action Day on Friday, November 7, using the hashtags #CareatHomeMonth and #OneVoiceforCareatHome. Alliance members also have access to a range of other National Care at Home Month outreach resources. For more information on planning for and receiving care at home, visit the Alliance’s free consumer resource, CaringInfo.org. Editor's Note: For more information, visit "November 2025 Healthcare Observances" and our newsletter's ongoing "Healthcare Observances" (under the "Resources" tab on our website).

Rethinking slow codes: Gina Piscitello, Parker Crutchfield, Jason WassermanGeriPal podcast; by Eric Widera, Alex Smith, Gina Piscitello, Parker Crutchfield, Jason Wasserman; 10/23/25I’m going to begin with a wonderful quote from a recent editorial in Bioethics by our guests Parker Crutchfield & Jason Wasserman. This quote illustrates the tension between the widely held view in bioethics that slow codes are unethical, and the complexity of real world hospital practice: “Decisive moral positions are easy to come by when sitting in the cheap seats of academic journals, but a troubling ambivalence is naturally characteristic of live dilemmas.” ... Today we talk about what constitutes a slow code, short code, show code, and “Hollywood code.” We talk about walk don’t run, shallow compressions, and…injecting the epi into the mattress! We explore the arguments for and against slow codes: harm to families, harm to patients, moral distress for doctors and nurses; deceit, trust, and communication; do outcomes (e.g. family feels code was attempted) matter more than values (e.g. never lie or withhold information from family)? ... One thing we can all agree about: the ethics of slow codes need a rethink.

Pastime activities, social connectedness, and grief resolution: A brief report highlighting the salience of socializing for grief resolution among bereaved older adultsThe Journal of Nervous & Mental Disease; by Xin Yao Lin, Holly G Prigerson, Yifan Chou, Paul K Maciejewski; 10/25We sought to examine the relationship between pastime activities (i.e., activity engagement), social connectedness with family and friends, and severity of Prolonged Grief Disorder (PGD) symptoms across younger, middle-aged, and older adults. Cross-sectional findings showed that engagement in pastime activities (e.g., travel, sports) was associated with greater social connectedness for older adults, and social connectedness was associated with lower PGD symptom severity. Engagement in pastime activities was associated with lower PGD symptom severity for middle-aged adults. Results are consistent with the socioemotional selectivity theory and the microsociological theory of adjustment to loss and suggest that grief interventions should have age-specific strategies, encourage specific pastime activities, and promote feelings of social connectedness.