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Hospice Protocol
Marie Steinmetz MD:
I have been asked by our local hospice to help with working on their criteria for acupuncture in hospice patients. I thought this would be a good forum to pull together ideas and we possibly could develop a protocol for other hospices around the country. The areas to cover are:
1. Goals
2. Indications
3. Contraindications
4. Techniques/modalities
5. Educational requirements
6. Clinical supervision
7. Equipment and supplies
8. Quality assurance
Once I finish I can get to AAMA for others to use.
Holly Leeds:
While you are working on this, add in how you plan to doocument the treatments. We who have studied acupuncture know where the points are, but others don't. Bruising, small amounts of bleeding, and in the very tender of skin- pain are often things that others want to know of. This is especially importnant since other medical professionals will be seeing these patients as well. I just started working with someone in our hospital, and the nursing issues were the most important. I left them with one of the many point maps to use as referrence.
Kimber Rotchford:
This a great idea and thanks for sending it out Marie,
For the moment I just have a couple of comments...with regard to pain management we should clearly emphasize acupuncture as adjunctive therapy to reduce the need for narcotics and their side effects. Team work is clearly essential in Hospice work and any practitioner involved needs to have the inclination and training to be part of a comprehensive team. I think requirement should be similar to those recommended for hospital privileges.
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