School: University of Pittsburgh

The Pre-Medical Hospice Program has been one of the most rewarding experiences I have had as a pre-medical student. It is easy to get bogged down by the classes and the technical aspects of getting into medical school. I feel like often as a pre-medical student people lose sight of what is important. They forget … Continue reading “Self Growth Through Hospice Volunteering”

In the healthcare profession, we are told that dealing with death is difficult, and will continue to be difficult because losing our patients can make us feel guilty or responsible. It really is strange when you are the caretaker of someone and they just pass away under your care. That was not the most difficult … Continue reading “My Experiences with Hospice”

4/23/17 Over the course of the eight months that I have been volunteering in the Hospice unit, I have learned a lot, not only about the medical profession but also about myself. Before this experience, death was always a very sad and scary concept to me. Because of my view on death, I liked to … Continue reading “My Changing View of Death”

Working in Hospice has made me realize how vital end of life training is within the healthcare system. I realized throughout this program that death is not synonymous with failure; rather, death is an inevitable aspect in every life. However, with proper care and support, death can even hold beauty. Although I do not think … Continue reading “Experiences with Hospice”

My experience in the hospice program has been something that will stay with me throughout my career and throughout my life. I have had experience with death in my life, but never to this extent. I have had friends pass from drug overdoses and loved ones die peacefully in their sleep, but never within this … Continue reading “My Experience in Hospice”

What is death? What does death mean? Those were both things that before Hospice I had never truly reflected on or wanted to reflect on. But this year when I saw the open volunteer position I decided it was something that I wanted to explore. I wanted to to explore this other aspect of life; … Continue reading “Be here, while I am here”

Live in the Moment Live in the moment and really appreciate what I have are the most central feelings after volunteering in this hospice program. This experience makes me truly feel the death and dying process. At the beginning, death was only a word to me; nothing really came up to my mind when I … Continue reading “Live in the Moment”

“I have come to know that it [death] is an important thing to keep in mind — not to complain or to make melancholy, but simply because only with the honest knowledge that one day I will die I can ever truly begin to live.” —R.A. Salvatore, The Halfling’s Gem As I prepared myself to … Continue reading “Death as a Means to Life”

Hospice. A place where people who deserve more than they are given go to temporarily live and permanently perish. This is what I thought hospice was before I came to the VA. A place with dejected patients, pessimistic nurses, families on the verge of collapse. And on top of that, this was a VA, a … Continue reading “The Place Between Life and Death”

One of my most meaningful hospice relationships formed about halfway through my experience as a volunteer this past year. It was a pretty slow day so I was helping with random office work behind the front desk during the first half of my shift. As I was doing office work with one of the other … Continue reading “An Unexpected Friend”