Medicare defines hospice as care provided to patients who, due to a terminal illness, "have a medical prognosis that his or her life expectance is 6 months or less if the illness runs its normal course." However, a medical prognosis is an educated prediction of the course of an illness. Physicians cannot predict a lifespan with complete certaincy. Therefore, many hospice patients live well beyond the initial 6-month prognosis, with Medicare, Medicaid, or private insurance coverage going uninterrupted for 1, 2, even 3 years of care.

In addition to patients with terminal cancer, hospice also cares for patients in the end stages of illnesses such as Alzheimer's, Dementia, Stroke or Cardiovascular Accident (CVA), Congestive Heart Failure (CHF), Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), Coronary Artery Disease (CAD), and Parkinson's disease.

For symptoms not related to the hospice diagnosis (or illness), a hospice patient may go to the hospital for treatment as they normally would. Symptoms related directly to the hospice illness are generally treated in the home setting. However, a hospice patient always has the right to go to a hospital if he chooses so.

A hospice patient may continue to see his/her PCP, as normal, for both non-related illnesses and the hospice diagnosis (or illness).

Unlike home health care, hospice patients may participate in any activity they choose and are not restricted to their home. In fact, hospice encourages patients to get out and enjoy life.

A hospice admits a patient under one diagnosis (or illness) and provides pain management and all elements of care related to that specific illness. Therefore, the patient is free to recieve care and/or treatmentfor all other illnesses as normal. That care may include home health care. In the case of a dialysis patient, a patient may continue to recieve hospice care as long as the dialysis isn't related to the hospice admitting diagnosis.