Quiet Oaks Providing Hospice Care in St. Cloud for 15 Years

ST. CLOUD (WJON News) -- The Quiet Oaks Hospice House has been in our community for 15 years.

It's an eight-bed residential hospice home that also partners with many home hospice agencies that go out into people's homes to provide care.

Executive Director Linda Allen says there are only about 10 of these facilities in Minnesota.

So we are very unique. If we look around, the area in Duluth and Edina are probably some of our closest hospice partners, but we don't have this service in mass around here. We need it, we need more.

Allen says they have a two-to-one ratio of staff to patients, but she calls their over 200 volunteers the backbone of what they do. Volunteers help with everything from gardening, preparing meals, office work, and direct patient care.

While 80 percent of people say they want to die at home the reality is only about 20 percent do.

Allen says while they are a small eight-bed facility they have a lot of responsibilities.

I say we are three unique facilities we are a healthcare facility so we have the maintenance of that, we are a business and even though we are a 501c3 nonprofit we still are a business and operate as a business, and then we are a home and offer home-like comforts. There are lots of chores to do.

Allen says their patients typically come from a 60-mile radius.

Forty-five percent of the people they care for are cancer patients.

Allen describes the work that they do as 'the closest we come to heaven's door'. They like to focus on creating special memories for the families.

They also provide respite care to give primary caregivers a break when they need it.