Business of Dying

Business of dying

There are a lot of businesses that revolve around death. “Some of the most financially successful health care providers are those whose patients usually die” (Hallman, Forster, 2015, para 1). Hospice itself has seen a 15 percent increase in their profit margins in 2012 (Hallman, 2015). A couple of health care profit margins are For-profit Hospice, Home Health Agencies, Skilled Nursing Facilities, Inpatient Rehab Facilities, All Hospices, Long Term Care Hospitals, Non-profit Hospices and Hospitals. The highest having a 15.4% profit margin and the lowest being a -5.5% profit margin (Hallman, 2015).

Hospice is a relatively new service which aids to those who are diagnosed with a terminal illness that has six months or less to live. Hospice has rapidly expanded and is a high option for those who have a loved one on their way to death or for a person who knows they are on their way out. In 1998 Hospice had about 400,000 patients and in 2012 they grew to having 1,300,000 patients (Hallman, 2015).

With such a dramatic growth of patients, they have also had an immense growth in money. With a vast increase in money, it is expected that they would begin to have lawsuits to see where exactly the money is coming from and if it is all legal. These claims included “billing fraud, alleging they enrolled patients who didn’t qualify and signed them up for extra-expensive levels of care” (Hallman, 2015, para 8). On average, at a non-profit hospice care facility the amount of days spent there as a patient is around 60 days whereas in a for-profit hospice facility the average days there is about 105 per patient.

When we visited the funeral home I was surprised to see just how much a funeral home is allowed to do. Although they are not allowed to have all the equipment on the same property they are still allowed to be able to pick up the dead body and even act as the coroner if one is not present, be the transportation, embalm the body, cremate...