Lance Gatlin – Hospice Hero

Halcyon Hospice – Dunwoody, Ga.

The “heart” of any viable hospice program is in its pool of volunteers – those folks who sacrifice their time to help others going through the end of life. Although a volunteer program is a Medicare mandate for our agencies, we often find that our volunteers are the backbone of our staffing and that it would be hard to adequately serve our patients and families without their services.

Halcyon Hospice in Dunwoody, Ga., has one of those priceless volunteers. Lance Gatlin just started volunteering this past January and has already had a profound impact on our patients. Lisa Nock, volunteer coordinator for Dunwoody and the Atlanta IPU, had a “difficult” first meeting with a patient, his wife and Lance.  They were not too sure they really needed a volunteer. They agreed to let Lance come out to their home once a week for a few weeks just to try it out. The few visits turned into weekly visits for the six months the patient was on our service.  Lance always went on Saturdays at the same time, as requested by the patient and his wife. He even went to visit the patient at the IPU when he was sent there for crisis management of symptoms.

Lance noticed that the patient was working on a large puzzle the first time he and Lisa had visited. Every week when he visited with the patient, they worked on the puzzle together until they finished it. Lance also discovered that the patient loved working on model ships, so he ordered one for the patient and one for himself to work on.  Although the patient was too ill to work on the ship, he enjoyed teaching Lance and watching the progress they made each week on their ships.  When the patient passed away, his wife called Lance and he spent eight hours with her that day and attended the viewing and funeral.

Lance found out what was important to this patient and then fit that into his visits. He took the time to break down the wall of resistance he initially encountered with the patient and his wife.  Lance, you really made a difference for this patient and his family. You are our “Hospice Hero!”