If this caught you by surprise, please know it surprises almost every family — it’s one of the most common discoveries in hospice care, and there’s no way you could have known until you were living it. The hospice team manages comfort, medication and clinical oversight through visits a few times each week, and a hospice nurse is always on call by phone, day or night. The hands-on caregiving between those visits, though, belongs to family — or to professional caregivers from a home care agency brought in to help. That’s exactly what we do: personal care, meals, overnight presence and everything in between, from a few hours to around the clock, so you can be present without being the entire care team.

Yes — it’s allowed, and it’s very common. Professional caregivers from a licensed home care agency (sometimes called private-duty care) work side by side with hospice all the time. Hospice provides the medical and comfort-care oversight; our caregivers provide the non-medical support — bathing, dressing, repositioning, meals, companionship, overnight presence and family respite. The two teams coordinate, and nothing about your hospice benefits or care changes.

Not at all. Professional caregivers from a home care agency don’t replace or conflict with hospice — they support the same goal from a different side. We work alongside hospice clinical teams every week across St. Louis: hospice directs the plan of comfort, and we make sure someone caring and capable is at the bedside for the hours in between.

Many families don’t fully realize — until they’re living it — that hospice doesn’t provide continuous, around-the-clock staffing. Visits are often an hour or so, a few times a week, and hospice’s “continuous care” level is reserved for short periods of acute symptoms. There is always a hospice nurse available by phone, day or night, and that truly matters. But having someone physically there with your loved one through the night is a different kind of reassurance. That’s where professional caregivers from a home care agency come in: we staff overnight, weekend and full 24/7 schedules with consistent caregivers and backups ready — so no one in your family has to carry this alone.

This is an important distinction, and we’d rather share it gently now than have it surprise you later: hospice itself — the nurses, medications and equipment — is covered under the hospice benefit, usually through Medicare. Non-medical home care from an agency like ours is a separate service, and it is not covered by the hospice or palliative benefit. It’s private pay (out of pocket), and we also work with long-term care insurance, VA benefits and grants. The cost depends entirely on the schedule — a few overnights a week is very different from continuous coverage — and we’ll walk through exact pricing for your situation in a complimentary consultation, with no minimums and no pressure.

They’re partners, not competitors. Hospice is a medical benefit focused on comfort at end of life — nurses, medications, equipment and visits, typically covered by Medicare. Home care is non-medical, hands-on daily support — personal care, supervision, meals, overnight presence — typically private pay. Many families use both at the same time, working together: hospice for the medical care, home care for the hours.

Yes, absolutely. Help with daily living, meals, transportation to treatment and overnight support while your loved one continues therapy for cancer, heart failure, Parkinson’s or another serious illness — with care plans that flex from a few days a week to full-time as needs change.