At Hospice of the North Shore (HNS), we provide comprehensive and compassionate support for individuals and families dealing with life-threatening illnesses.
Our Mission
Since 1978 when HNS was founded, our mission has changed very little:
To enrich quality of life by providing expert care, support, consultation and education for those affected by life-limiting illness, death and loss.
Using a team approach, our goal is to give patients and their loved ones the critical emotional, physical and spiritual support they need. Our advanced expertise in pain and symptom management helps patients be as pain-free and comfortable as possible.
The end result? Lives are enriched. The quality of each day is improved. There is so much life in the days we spend with our patients and their loved ones. Days filled with closeness, caring, comfort, compassion, and support, with the knowledge that there is always someone to call.
- Founded in 1978 as an all-volunteer, grassroots organization, we’ve grown to become the largest not-for-profit hospice in Massachusetts.
- A freestanding program, we provide care in 44 cities and towns north of Boston (all of Essex County and surrounding communities).
- We are the area's first and most experienced provider of end-of-life care, and have served more than 20,000 terminally ill adults and children at home, in nursing facilities, and in hospitals.
- We work with physicians and other health care professionals as well as clergy and community organizations to create a broader understanding of end-of-life issues throughout our cities and towns.
- We developed the Center for Grief & Healing to expand our ability to help anyone in the community who is dealing with grief and loss. Local businesses, community groups, and schools turn to us for ongoing support and education.
- Through Palliative Care of the North Shore, a program of HNS, we’ve brought a unique model of advanced pain and symptom management expertise to care for people with serious, progressive illness who do not want or need full hospice care.
- In September 2005, we opened the Kaplan Family Hospice House at 78 Liberty Street in Danvers. This 12-bed Hospice House has become home for terminally ill people who, for whatever reason, need an alternative to home as their illness progresses. It adds a much-needed dimension to hospice care for the region. Not a hospital, a nursing home or a rehabilitation facility, the Kaplan House offers a home-like setting where hospice nurses and support staff provide 24-hour care and where visiting family members can spend quality time with their loved ones during the final weeks and days of life. It is the only Hospice House on the North Shore, and was the first in the state to be built according to new state regulations for licensure of a freestanding hospice inpatient facility.