What Constitutes Patient Abandonment for an RN Case Manager in Hospice?

A professional hospice nurse/case manager is a registered nurse trained in evaluating and caring for terminally ill patients and helping their families. Since they must provide constant care for patients, abandonment by hospice nurses can severely impair patient care.

Significance

• Patient abandonment occurs when a nurse accepts the assignment for a patient and leaves the facility without transferring patient care. For a case management nurse, this can include home health care, counseling, or other services without giving significant notice to the patient and is true for hospice nurses as well.

Features

• A nurse is not considered to have abandoned a patient if he gives reasonable notice to the appropriate person that he is unable to carry out his duties; for instance, if he is mentally or physically too tired to provide safe care.

Considerations

• Hospices who are short on staff may have problems, since they are legally required to have 24-hour nursing services available. Issues that can complicate patient abandonment include: short staffing, reassigning staff and refusing extension of duty hours.