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Medicare Covers Hospice Care

Published

12 years ago

May 17, 2014

Coping with terminal illness can be very difficult – for the patient as well as his or her loved ones.

That’s why I want to pass along some information about Medicare’s coverage of hospice care.

Hospice is a program of care and support for people who are terminally ill. The focus is on comfort, not on curing illness. Hospice is intended to help people who are terminally ill live comfortably.

If you qualify for Medicare’s hospice benefit, you’ll have a specially trained team and support staff to help you and your family deal with your illness.

You and your family members are the most important part of the team.

Your team may also include doctors, nurses, counselors, social workers, physical and occupational therapists, speech-language pathologists, hospice aides, and homemakers.

The hospice team provides care for the whole person. That includes his or her physical, emotional, and social needs.

Hospice services are generally provided in the home and may include physical care, counseling, drugs, and medical equipment and supplies for the terminal illness plus any related conditions.

Your regular doctor or a nurse practitioner can also be part of your team, to supervise your care.

Who’s eligible for Medicare-covered hospice services? You have to meet several conditions.

For one, you must be eligible for Medicare Part A, which is hospital insurance.

Also, your doctor and the hospice medical director must certify that you’re terminally ill and have six months or less to live, if your illness runs its normal course.

You have to sign a statement choosing hospice care instead of other Medicare-covered benefits to treat your terminal illness. (Medicare will still pay for covered benefits for any health problems that aren’t related to your terminal illness.)

And you must get care from a Medicare-approved hospice program.

If you qualify, your doctor and the hospice team will work with you and your family to set up a care plan that meets your needs.

A hospice doctor and nurse will be on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week to give you and your family support and care when you need it.

Medicare’s hospice benefit allows you and your family to stay together in the comfort of your home unless you need care in an inpatient facility.

You have the right to stop hospice care at any time.

Medicare will pay for a one-time-only consultation with a hospice medical director or hospice doctor to discuss your care options and how to manage your pain and symptoms.

After that, Medicare covers doctor and nurse services; equipment such as wheelchairs or walkers; supplies such as bandages and catheters; drugs to control pain or other symptoms; hospice aide and homemaker services; physical and occupational therapy; and social worker services.

Medicare also covers dietary counseling; grief and loss counseling for you and your family; short-term inpatient care for pain and symptom management; and short-term respite care.

Respite care is designed to help the caregiver for a terminally person. Often a spouse or other family member becomes the caregiver, and at some point they may need a rest.

You can get respite care in a Medicare-approved hospice inpatient facility, hospital, or nursing home if your caregiver needs a rest.

You can stay up to five days each time. You can get respite care more than once, but it can only be provided on an occasional basis.

How much do you pay for hospice under Medicare?

There’s no deductible. You’ll pay no more than $5 for each prescription drug and similar products for pain relief and symptom control.

If you get inpatient respite care, you pay five percent of the Medicare-approved amount. For example, if Medicare pays $100 per day for inpatient respite care, you’ll pay $5 per day.

David Sayen is Medicare’s regional administrator for Arizona, California, Nevada, Hawaii, and the Pacific Territories

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Poll Shows Support for Policies That Help Families Afford Child Care

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

Published

19 hours ago

March 2, 2026

Oakland Post

By First Five Years Fund

New national polling shows persistent voter concern about the affordability and availability of child care for working parents, alongside broad support across key demographic groups for federal child care policies that help families afford care.

The national survey was conducted by UpOne Insight on behalf of the First Five Years Fund from January 13–18, 2026.

Key findings include:

• Parents need help: 80% of voters say the ability of working parents to find and afford child care is either in a state of crisis or a major problem.

• This is an affordability issue: 82% believe federal child care funding will help lower costs for working families — including 69% of Republicans, 84% of Independents, and 94% of Democrats.

• And there continues to be strong support (62%) for the Child Care and Development Block Grant (CCDBG), a federal program that makes it possible for hundreds of thousands of families to afford safe, quality care for their children while parents work or go to school, including a majority of Republicans, 63% of Independents and 72% of Democrats.

• Support for funding child care programs remains strong: 75% believe child care funding should be increased or kept at current levels — including 75% of Republicans, 85% of Independents, and 97% of Democrats.

• 74% say funding for child care is an important and good use of tax dollars, including a majority of Republicans, three-quarters of Independents, and nine in ten Democrats.

FFYF Executive Director Sarah Rittling said, “Voters across the country are sending a clear message: federal child care and early learning programs work. These investments help parents stay in the workforce, strengthen families, and support healthy child development. They have also long had strong bipartisan support in Congress. At a time when affordability is top of mind for families, continued federal funding is essential to ensure child care remains accessible and within reach.”

First Five Years Fund works to protect, prioritize, and build bipartisan support for quality child care and early learning programs at the federal level. Reliable, affordable, and high-quality early learning and child care can be transformative, not only enhancing a child’s prospects for a brighter future but also bolstering working parents and fostering economic stability nationwide.

We work with Congress and the Administration to identify federal solutions that work for families with young children, as well as states and communities. We work with policymakers to identify ways to increase access to affordable, high-quality child care and early learning programs for children. And we collaborate with advocacy groups to help align best practices with the best possible policies. http://www.ffyf.org

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Oakland Post: Week of February 25 – March 3, 2026

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of – February 25 – March 3, 2026

Published

2 days ago

March 1, 2026

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Trump’s MAGA Allies are Creating Executive Order Plan to Steal the 2026 Midterms

NNPA NEWSWIRE — The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

Published

4 days ago

February 27, 2026

Oakland Post

By Lauren Victoria Burke, NNPA Newswire Correspondent

A group of MAGA pro-Trump activists, who say they are working in coordination with the White House, are circulating a 17-page draft executive order that would claim without evidence that China interfered with the 2020 presidential election. Donald Trump lost the 2020 presidential to President Joe Biden by over 7 million votes. Since Trump lost to Biden in 2020, he has repeatedly claimed that the election was “stolen” without evidence. The report of a group of “Trump allies” preparing an executive order to give Trump power over elections was first reported by The Washington Post.

The lies around the right-wing campaign that pushed falsehoods that the 2020 election was stolen was trafficked through right-wing media, particularly Fox News. Fox News was then sued for defamation for the claims by Dominion Voting Systems. Fox lost the case and had to settle for the largest defamation amount on record of $787.5 million in April 2023.

The document that could lead to an executive order proposes using the claim that China interfered with the 2020 elections as grounds to “declare a national emergency.” The move would be an unprecedented step that would grant Trump new authority over the voting systems in the U.S.

The story in The Washington Post arrives as Trump increasingly signals that he may take actions that would alter the result of the 2026 midterms. The Republicans are widely expected to lose as their approval ratings plummet as a result of a failing economy under Trump. Over 50 members of Congress have announced they will retire this year and not return in 2027.

The Trump Department of Justice, which now has a large image of Trump on the side of it, “sued five new states Thursday [Feb. 26, 2026] demanding access to their unredacted voter rolls — escalating a campaign that has been rejected by multiple federal courts and faces resistance from Republican-led states as well,” according to Democracy Docket, a group that works to protect voting rights.

Trump claimed back in late 2020, the last year of his first term, that he had the authority to issue an executive order related to mail-in voting for the 2020 elections — which he would then lose. But the Constitution states that control of elections lies with the states. As the GOP works to place hurdles in front of voting, Democrats worked to make voting easier.

In March 2021, President Biden signed an executive order calling on federal agencies to expand voting access as part of the Biden Administration’s effort “to promote and defend the right to vote for all Americans who are legally entitled to participate in elections.”

Trump’s focus is clearly on altering the November 2026 midterm elections. Trump’s polling numbers and the elections and special elections that have taken place around the U.S. over the last year clearly indicate that Republicans are about to be hit by a blue wave of Democratic victories.

Lauren Victoria Burke is an independent investigative journalist and the founder of Black Virginia News. She is a political analyst who appears on #RolandMartinUnfiltered and hosts the show LAUREN LIVE on YouTube @LaurenVictoriaBurke. She can be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke