Last verified: October 2026
What is hospice care?
Hospice is comfort-focused care for a person with a terminal illness whose physician expects six months or less to live if the illness runs its usual course, delivered by a team of nurses, aides, social workers and chaplains wherever the patient lives.
CMS lists 29 Medicare-certified hospices with Pima County offices. See them →
Can a Tucson assisted living resident receive hospice?
Yes. Arizona's rules let a facility licensed for personal care keep a resident who receives services from a licensed hospice service agency, and directed care facilities follow the same exception rules.
That means many residents can stay in their own room through the end of life rather than move to a nursing home.
What does Medicare pay for in hospice?
Medicare's hospice benefit pays for the hospice team, medications and equipment related to the terminal illness, and short respite stays, but not for room and board in an assisted living facility or nursing home.
ALTCS members can receive hospice too; their room-and-board arrangements stay as they were.
How do you choose a hospice in Tucson?
Ask how quickly a nurse can visit after a call at night, how often aides visit each week, whether the hospice has its own inpatient unit or contracts for one, and what bereavement support it offers the family.
You can change hospice providers if the first one is not working.
When should a family ask about hospice?
Ask about hospice when hospital visits are becoming frequent, when treatments are no longer working or wanted, or when a physician says the illness is advanced; an evaluation commits you to nothing.
Pima Council on Aging also offers end-of-life care planning resources, including advance directive information.
What happens to assisted living rent when a resident starts hospice?
Nothing changes on the rent side: the resident or family keeps paying the facility's room and board and care charges, and the hospice adds its own team and supplies at no extra cost to Medicare beneficiaries for the terminal illness.
Some facilities lower their care-level charge if the hospice aide covers bathing, so ask. ALTCS members' arrangements continue as before. Keep the facility and the hospice talking: agree who calls the family after a change in condition, who manages pain medication at night, and where the comfort kit of emergency medications is stored.
Hospice vs. palliative care
| Hospice | Palliative care | |
|---|---|---|
| Prognosis | six months or less if the illness runs its course | any stage |
| Curative treatment | set aside | can continue |
| Room and board in a facility | not covered by Medicare | not covered by Medicare |
