Further development of the hospice program operated by Southeast Missouri Hospital through a combined effort among hospice staff, volunteers and area physicians is the goal of new Director for Hospice Services Simon B. Paquette.

Paquette, formerly director of Hospice Services for Rockingham Visiting Nurse Association and Hospice in Exeter, N.H., joined the Southeast staff in January.

Southeast's hospice program currently serves patients in the Missouri counties of Cape Girardeau, Scott, Stoddard, Bollinger and Perry.

Paquette said plans are under way to enlarge the service area and that a call will go out soon to recruit volunteers for additional southeast Missouri counties.

Volunteers, Paquette said, form an essential core of hospice work. After completing special training, volunteers provide direct service to patients and families during the stressful times before and after death.

"All of us working with Southeast's hospice program are committed to working not just with patients, but with patients, families and physicians," Paquette said. "Hospice is primarily a concept of care, a philosophy of dealing with terminal illness and death, rather than a place of care. Our hospice program if founded upon the team approach in providing for terminally ill patients and their families and medical nursing, psychological, social and spiritual support they need before and after the death of the patient."

As part of his work with the Rockingham Visiting Nurse Association and Hospice, Paquette directed the coordination of terminal illness care for clients and families in more than 22 towns in New Hampshire. He also researched funding sources, coordinated fund-raising projects and marketed the program to clients, agencies and the medical community.

In 1991, he successfully merged a volunteer-intensive hospice program with a Visiting Nurses Association.

Working with Paquette in the hospice office, located at 760 S. Kingshighway, are Dr. Dix R. Morgan, medical director, Judy Aslin, Hospice Patient Care Manager, and Carol Keppler, volunteer coordinator.

Until his retirement last summer, Morgan served seven years as director of Radiation Oncology at Southeast's Regional Cancer Center. His 30-plus years in medicine include several years spent in general practice, a time during which he became aware of the challenges cancer can present to both physician and patient. That interest convinced him to complete a fellowship in Radiation Oncology at the University of Kentucky and devote his full-time interest to treatment of cancer patients. As medical director, Morgan will coordinate patient care with the hospice nursing staff and the patient's physician.

"I've seen the positive impact that hospice can have on the patient and his family," Morgan said. "Remaining at home, in a familiar environment with family and friends, means a great deal to terminally ill patients."

Under hospice guidelines, the terminally ill patient is considered to have six months or less to live.

Aslin has been associated with Southeast since 1983, most recently as nurse manager of the hospital's oncology nursing unit. Keppler has been employed in the medical field for more than 15 years, both in the physician office setting and at Southeast.

According to a recent poll conducted for the National Hospice Organization, nine of 10 Americans say that if faced with a terminal illness, they would prefer to be cared for and die either in their own home or a family member's home.

National Hospice Organization statistics show that there are currently 1,830 hospice programs in the United States that served over 210,000 terminally ill persons in 1991.

Since its inception in 1986, Southeast's hospice program has served over 230 individuals ranging in age from 6-88.

Paquette said: "We want to continue to develop the many fine things that Southeast has already done with hospice, always keeping in mind the reason that we exist, to help make the final days for terminally ill patients and their families as positive and constructive as possible."