VITAS Healthcare

My recently deceased husband was a patient at the Memorial City site. Although his inpatient care was excellent, the care we received as a family after his death has been atrocious. Having anybody return phone calls is almost a lost cause — it’s takes a minimum of between one and three days to get answers if you have a question. The doctor pronouncing his death left town before signing the death certificate, delaying cremation and interment at the national cemetery by weeks. Incomplete filling out of that certificate has resulted in the expense necessary to amend and revise the death certificate and cost of new corrected copies.
My mother was in hospice in Amarillo, her care was excellent and I had high hopes for VITAS. My advice for anybody who needs hospice for their loved one is to choose another agency.

Okay, let’s be completely honest. No one ever wants to need hospice care for a loved one. No one ever wants to call hospice, but my guess is sooner or later we will all have some involvement with them. Mine came earlier than I would have liked.
I met with the first person from Vitas, while my father was in a hospital room due to the effects of end stage liver disease caused by cancer. She was kind, soft spoken, and very sweet. Exactly what a grieving family needs. Then, she sent a nurse by to assess my father, she was not what we needed. She seemed surprised that we didn’t know all about hospice care and that we didn’t know that it meant taking him off his IV which was his only source of nutrients. I felt that she was very abrupt with us, but she was gentle and caring with my father.
He was in hospice care at home and Vitas had all the needed equipment, personnel, and medications there within about 6 hours of meeting with us. The shift RN who was with us the first night was amazing. She was very knowledgeable and explained everything that was happening with my father, how they would care for him, and also care for us. We had a fantastic social worker and supervising RN, they brought materials for my daughter to help me explain to her what was happening to her PopPop and I will be honest it helped me too. They were very supportive of the family, answering our questions, helping with paperwork and referrals, including helping make the last arrangements for him.
They offered a member of the clergy to be there for us. They also will be there for us for the next 16 months to help with grief and other issues that may arise. After his passing, I was given a copy of the notes and all notes were very through and for me shed some light on the things he was going through.
My father passed on the day shift which means a nurse had to be called to pronounce the time, I felt that she was cold and appeared to have no sympathy. I understand that she may see this a lot, but please remember, he may no longer be here, but he was my father and that day was hard enough without dealing with your lack of emotions.
The only reason they did not get 5 stars was those 2 staff members I mentioned. The rest of the staff is awesome and have continued to help and answer questions for me even now.