As used in this part, the term:(1) “Agency” means the Agency for Health Care Administration.
(2) “Department” means the Department of Elderly Affairs.
(3) “Hospice” means a centrally administered corporation or a limited liability company that provides a continuum of palliative and supportive care for the terminally ill patient and his or her family.
(4) “Hospice care team” means an interdisciplinary team of qualified professionals and volunteers who, in consultation with the patient, the patient’s family, and the patient’s primary or attending physician, collectively assess, coordinate, and provide the appropriate palliative and supportive care to hospice patients and their families.
(5) “Hospice residential unit” means a homelike living facility, other than a facility licensed under other parts of this chapter, under chapter 395, or under chapter 429, that is operated by a hospice for the benefit of its patients and is considered by a patient who lives there to be his or her primary residence.
(6) “Hospice services” means items and services furnished to a patient and family by a hospice, or by others under arrangements with such a program, in a place of temporary or permanent residence used as the patient’s home for the purpose of maintaining the patient at home; or, if the patient needs short-term institutionalization, the services shall be furnished in cooperation with those contracted institutions or in the hospice inpatient facility.
(7) “Palliative care” means services or interventions which are not curative but are provided for the reduction or abatement of pain and human suffering.
(8) “Patient” means the terminally ill individual receiving hospice services.
(9) “Plan of care” means a written assessment by the hospice of each patient’s and family’s needs and preferences, and the services to be provided by the hospice to meet those needs.
(10) “Terminally ill” means that the patient has a medical prognosis that his or her life expectancy is 1 year or less if the illness runs its normal course.
