VITAS Healthcare - Stuart

They sent a aide named Teresa who was bossy , controlling, rude , cold ,indifferent , argumentative, and slept the entire night on the job ! She only went in to see the patient ONCE in the entire night at 6:39 am when she was about to leave . She made a scene, when I asked her to keep her voice down . She also watched something on her phone at full volume when the patient and I were sitting together trying to talk .And continued listening at full volume when we went to sleep. Does she get paid to do that ???? And then told me “you can’t get rid of us “ Poor attitude ! Total disgrace !!!!! Do. NOT use them for your loved ones!!!! Very ,Very poor service No love ,No caring ,No compassion, No concern Just trying to get paid $ BTW, Cathy was Great !!!

VITAS is a clown show. The nurses that came were very caring. The chaplain was wonderful. The doctor who came once was very caring. The nurse practitioner was very caring. The nurse aide who came to give my husband bed baths was very caring. The problem was that so much was promised and basically nothing was delivered. VITAS looks great on paper. The nursing visits were supposed to be twice a week on certain days that had been arranged between the nurse and me. It was supposed to be the same nurse each visit and the on same days each week. As it turned out, the nursing visits were sporadic and random. We often went ten days without seeing a nurse, and they simply sent whatever nurse happened to be in our area at the time. When my husband was imminent, they said there would be 24 hour nursing care. That didn’t happen. They couldn’t staff it. Instead they said they would send a nurse every 4 hours. That didn’t happen. They couldn’t staff it. Then they said they would send a hospice trained nurse aide for 12 hour shifts around the clock. They were a no-show. My husband was just hours from passing, and a clown of a doctor offered him antibiotics. The VA insisted that we needed to use this agency because they were the best. The VA must have some kind of deal going on with VITAS. Perhaps a contract? My advice to the VA is to drop VITAS as quickly as possible. Do not use this hospice agency if you want your loved one to receive the care they deserve.

I chose Vitas for hospice care of my dying father, but the service they've provided has been pathetic. He slept in a recliner with metastasized pancreatic cancer for 5 days before his hospital bed arrived, no sheets were provided and they had not made any arrangements for him to be lifted from his recliner into his hospital bed. Further, I was told that they provided 3 visits per week from a nurse's aide to do things like bathing, shaving and so forth, but today marks an entire week since he came home and only after SEVERAL calls and text messages did they finally send someone on Saturday who said she was UNABLE to do all those care items because poor accessibility due to him not being in a hospital bed! She also noted that we should have already received all the supplies for her to use (bed pan, wash pan, etc), yet they have still not arrived after a week with Vitas! Today I asked when I could expect an aide to return since it's been a week and they only showed up once after I had to beg them to send someone, and they told me that nobody was on a schedule for this week!!! His "nurse" called me shortly after I complained and said that while the aide should visit 3 times a week that they'd only bathe him once and that "the family needs to step up and help some"!! He's been home for a week, sleeping in a recliner while Vitas has had a nurse come over twice to check his blood pressure and temperature -- not exactly wonderful care! If you want your loved one to die with dignity and you don't want to have to beg hospice to provide a minimal level of service, avoid Vitas at all costs. They've done basically nothing and made constant excuses instead of resolving these issues.