LAKE COUNTY, Calif. – Hospice Services of Lake County has been providing end-of-life care for Lake County residents with a life expectancy of less than six months for 38 years.

This past week, the organization received confirmation from Partnership HealthPlan that its application to become the Intensive Home-Based Palliative Care provider for Lake County has been approved.
 
Partnership HealthPlan administers Medi-Cal benefits for more than 560,000 people in 14 Northern California counties, including Lake.
 
In September 2016, Hospice Services added a new program, Lake County Transitions.

The Transitions Program was created to provide home-based care for patients in transition after or while still receiving curative treatments, but before they are ready for hospice care.
 
This new contract will allow Hospice Services to get reimbursed for the care that they’re already providing to those in the community in conjunction with their primary health care teams.

The program is designed for patients with more complex needs, within the last years of their lives, who are not yet candidates for hospice.
 
Some of the many services that they provide are symptom management, medication management, psychological counseling, support for family members, addressing unmet needs in the realm of appropriate living arrangements, discussions of advance directives and physician order of life sustaining treatment form completion, as well as other issues relating to the patient’s declining health status.
 
Hospice Services appreciates the support of many healthcare providers in our development of this program, specifically Sutter Lakeside Hospital, Adventist Clear Lake and Mark Turrill, MD for their letters of support for our application, as well as Lake County representatives on the Partnership Board of Commissioners: Karen Tait, MD, Lake County Public Health Director, and Robert Gardner, MD, Lucerne Community Clinic.
 
Hospice Services is grateful to align with Partnership HealthPlan in the development of this contract, as well as The California Health Care Foundation, which continues to provide financial and technical support to increase access to quality health care in our homes, here in Lake County.