Paradigm Health’s mission is to raise the bar of the hospice and palliative experience one family, one team member, one community at a time. For Paradigm Health Transitional Care Navigator Kelly Streza, her focus is on educating and supporting patients and their families as they identify individual goals of care. Streza shares she grew up in the Tipton area and is still living and working within the area she serves bringing above-and-beyond care to the Kokomo and surrounding communities including Howard, Tipton, Clinton and Boone Counties.
“As a transitional care navigator, I can meet with a patient and family to gather their unique healthcare story,” shares Streza. “This lets me get a holistic picture of what is going on to see if there has been a mental or physical decline, if hospital visits are increasing, if a more streamlined approach to doctor’s visits and medicines might be helpful and appropriate, and to offer recommendations for care and connection to resources.”
Oftentimes, says Streza, taking the time with each patient to understand where they’ve been and to help them identify and put in place goals of care is a huge step in making the hospice journey less overwhelming. Many believe that beginning hospice care is “giving up” but Streza says that is far from the true reality in most cases.
“I hear from patients and families all the time that they believe that hospice care means they have given up,” reflects Streza. “I share with them as much education as I can about hospice care and that it is really an extra layer of support that can eliminate many of the stresses of everyday clinical caregiving and allow for a streamlined approach to care based on individual goals and offered wherever a patient calls home.”
A transitional care navigator from Paradigm Health can help a patient and family to look ahead with the goal of enriching the quality of life each day.
“With a terminal disease, patients will have good days and bad days,” Streza says. “With hospice care, you can focus on the better days. I encourage patients to not waste their ‘good energy’ but to spend that energy on things they truly want to do like taking a walk, enjoying the outdoors from their porch or a park, or just having dinner with friends or family. It allows for more time to make memories with their family.”
Streza continues that hospice care allows for symptom management, connection to needed resources, and access to life enrichment programs that can make a real difference for the patient and family including music therapy, volunteer interaction, grief support and more. Since joining the Paradigm Health team, Streza says she feels incredibly supported and valued and that directly translates to her relationship with patients and families every day.
“We have some patients who are on hospice a short period of time and others for months,” Streza states. “It is so rewarding to me to be able to educate folks so they are more comfortable with the end-of-life process and help them overcome the uncertainty that sometimes comes with hospice care. The fact that I can work and live in the territory I serve is just a plus.”
Visit myparadigmhealth.com or call 317-735-6001 for more information on how the Paradigm Health team can help support you or your loved one.
