Hello everyone and welcome to the within range coaching podcast with Ranger.
I'm Ranger certified holistic success coach and in this podcast I'm breaking down the
journey that entrepreneurs face as they start their organization, find solutions and create
an impact that lasts.
So if you're an entrepreneur, nonprofit leader or purpose driven community member that wants
to learn how to make an impact in their home, community and world, then this is the podcast
for you.
I know you're just as eager as I am to get started.
So let's get right into it.
Good morning, good afternoon and good evening everybody.
This is your host Ranger and today I'm joined by very special guests.
As most of you know, I am starting my walk across the country here in just a couple of
weeks.
And during that walk, I'm going to be raising some money for a few different organizations
along with help from the wander projects.
And today I have a guest from one of those organizations.
Today we are joined by Rachel Arnold and I mean, I could list off all the accolades that
she has and what she's done for Grace hospice and the hospice promise foundation, but I'm
going to let her jump right in and introduce herself.
Rachel, how are you doing today?
I'm doing great.
Thank you so much for having me on and for such a great introduction.
That was absolutely wonderful.
I very much appreciate it.
I'm very excited.
Great.
No, that's great to hear.
I'm also excited to kind of get to chitter chat with you and have you kind of showcase
your organization and who you are.
So to just kind of jump straight into it, how is it that you'd like to be known?
Tell us about yourself.
Yeah.
So I'm Rachel Arnold and I am the masters of health administration.
I'm the executive director for Grace hospice here in Tulsa, Oklahoma.
I've been in hospice for a little over five years now and certified hospice manager working
towards my certified hospice administrator.
And I've been very blessed to be able to be a part of this organization here in Tulsa
for about a year and a half.
And have we've done some really great things in that in such a little amount of time that
I'm excited to share.
Awesome.
That's great to hear.
And our little conversations we had before the podcast, I know that you said that you
kind of fell into hospice on accident.
Can you kind of explain what that journey from, I guess, that pre hospice life to where
you are now, how that kind of happened?
Yeah, so I did.
I don't think a lot of people get into hospice right out of college.
A lot of people don't go out of college and say, you know, I really think that I want
to do hospice, that I want to deal with death and dying every day.
Most places don't even teach about hospice or what it can do or what you can do inside
of hospice.
So I was actually I went into management.
I did a little bit of interior design and then went into I.T.
I am not an I.T. professional.
I was in management.
I do not claim to know anything about electronics, but I was doing management and my best friend
at the time, my mentor, was working in hospice as a marketing executive and said, hey, this
position has come up and you've got it.
You've got to do this.
This is just perfect for you.
And I said, yeah, I don't know about that.
And she said, no, it's perfect for you.
I promise.
So I kind of sat on it and I thought about it.
And by the time I really got around to even, you know, thinking through the possibilities,
the position had closed.
But about a year later, the position opens up again.
And she says, I'm telling you, it closed because you weren't in this role.
You've got to be in this role.
So I was like, OK, I'm in a different place than I was a year ago.
Let me try it out.
So I went in for an interview.
And at the time, it was some of our executives from our Louisiana branch that had come up
and were interviewing for the position.
I remember going into the interview and just thinking, you know, this is just so crazy
that I'm even taking this.
I've been in my job for over five years.
Like I'm not I'm not looking to move.
But I remember sitting down and they were explaining to me what the company did and
how it took care of patients and families.
And they're going through all of this.
And I just remember sinking down into my chair and going, oh, no, I really like this place
and I really like these people now.
What?
So I left that interview like not even wanting the new job and not even not even thinking
that this was going to be a possibility.
What do I didn't know about health care?
I'm in I.T. What am I doing?
And I left and they called me back and they're like, hey, we just wanted to let you know,
like it went really well and we really like you.
We'd want to bring you back in for a second interview.
And I'm like, I really want a second interview, too.
So I ended up doing a second interview.
And I think I think maybe even had a third interview.
And every time the people that I was meeting through this interview process, every one
of them was just more genuine and better than the last.
And just like, wow, these people clearly are in this for the right reason.
And you don't see that in a lot of different industries.
And so I said, you know, I I don't know what I'm doing, but I think that this is what I
want to do.
So I ended up taking the position.
And some days I still don't feel as though I know what I'm doing.
But I will always stand by the fact that this is where I belong, that hospice is a calling
point.
Again, none of us come out of college going, I want to do hospice.
But the people who are brought here and that tend to make careers out of it really have
a heart for people, really have a heart for hospice.
And yeah, so five and a half years later, I'm still here and still trying to make a
difference in what I do.
Yeah, Rachel, thank you.
Thank you for sharing all of that.
And what's coming up for me as I'm hearing that story just has a lot to do with like
there's a certain feeling that came up for you that was really solidifying a conviction
in something.
And I'm curious, like when you're having that interview and you had all these doubts
of, I don't know if this is even right for me, like something some voice in your head
was saying, no, this is it.
Do it.
Like, what was that like for you?
Well, it was terrifying.
Medical as a whole is this big, huge kind of scary organization.
And for someone who's not in medical and really I had no desire to be in medical, it was scary
to lead people who are clinicians to, you know, from doctors to nurse practitioners,
LPN, AIDS, RNs, therapists, all of it, knowing that I'm going to come in and I'm going to
be a manager in this organization with all of these people, with all of this tenure,
who have all of these years of schooling, who know so much more than me.
What am I doing?
But these people who have the schooling and have this knowledge, they are dealing with
some of the most heavy medical stuff you'll deal with.
I think every part in the medical community, everybody plays a different part in it.
You know, you've got your ER trauma doctors, you have your pediatricians, you have your
hospice, you have your rehab, and each person plays a different part in people's lives as
they go throughout their lives and through their medical journeys.
And it was just very, very scary thinking that I'm going to come in and lead these people
who are making such a huge impact in other people's lives.
But, you know, I had right after I had, right before I had taken this position, I had just
given birth to my first and only child.
And I think that creates kind of something in some people of wanting to make a difference
and wanting to do something more with their lives.
And that was kind of where I was at was knowing that I wanted to be able to give back and
I'm not going to be able to do that through traditional care, you know, hands-on patient
care, but that I could do it through supporting those who did have that hands-on patient care.
And so that was that little voice inside of me that was like, yeah, you should keep going
with this.
You should do that second interview.
You should do that third interview.
I think it was just that desire in me to make a difference in a unique way, in a more hands-off
way.
And that's something else I was going to kind of reflect back in that it sounds like the
healthcare industry isn't exactly your first choice, but it's more so about supporting
those that are out there, like kind of like the front field runners, the first line, the
ER, the trauma doctors, the therapists, the counselors.
It sounds like for you, it's a lot about being a support of the people that are doing that
frontline work.
It is.
Absolutely.
It is.
I have said throughout my career in healthcare, you know, I'm not a clinician.
I'm not a clinician.
Now surprisingly, you do learn a lot just by being in such close proximity to clinicians.
I have seen things and heard things that I just never, never thought that I would be
exposed to.
But yeah, for me, it's being able to be in healthcare to make a difference in patients'
lives and having that hands-off approach.
There are so many things that go on behind the scenes of any clinic or hospital or hospice
or palliative or home health.
There's so many things that go on behind the scenes that no one ever sees.
And to be able to support these people who give their time and their talent, first of
all, but their souls to these patients.
Hospice is a hard job.
And so for me, being able to support them, to keep them going through their days, to
fill their cup up so that they can give back to patients and their families, that's a huge
role for me to be able to play that I just didn't really ever think was a possibility.
I didn't know that it was a career that was out there.
And it's been a very, very rewarding and enriching thing for me and for the other people who
are kind of back supporters to the front lines.
We all have that in common that we fill ourselves up so that we can fill up others.
We've been blessed so that we can bless others.
And that's what we do every day is keep those people going so that they can keep those families
going so that they can be supports in others' lives.
It's just a very unique thing.
Yeah.
It's the cup, being the cup filler of the people that fill the cups of others.
It's like going back in that care process to make sure that everybody has the tools
they need, whether it's physical tools or that mental, emotional, psychological needs
are met.
Because I can only imagine the kinds of things that you and your team see in hospice.
And I did kind of want to take a step back.
And if you could just kind of explain a little bit more of what hospice care actually looks
like.
Because I know that's something you've mentioned in our pre-talk a little bit about is being
able to explain the difference of what hospice is, what it isn't.
So could you just kind of go on a little, I guess, spiel about what hospice actually
looks like?
Yeah, absolutely.
So I think a lot of people have this idea in their heads of what hospice is.
And it's grandma is old and she is dying.
And so we're going to call hospice, they're going to administer morphine and she's going
to be dead soon.
And as blunt and as awful as that sounds, I think that's really what most people think
hospice is.
And that's just so far from the truth.
And that's why I love what I do, because I also get to educate on this.
This is the new hospice.
This is what hospice really is.
And so hospice is actually a service provided.
And it's provided at what we call end of life care.
So when you have a long term disease and you have decided that you don't want to continue
to seek a cure for that or a cure is not available, that's where hospice steps in.
And hospice says, we can help.
We will help make you comfortable.
We will help you make arrangements.
We will help make your family comfortable with your disease and with the things that
are going to happen next will basically be a support team for everything that you will
need for the next week, three months, six months, nine months, one year, two years,
whatever it may be.
So to be on hospice, you have to have two things.
You have to be eligible for hospice, which means you have to have a prognosis of six
months or less, assuming that the disease takes its normal course.
So with some people, the disease that they have, let's say it's cancer.
Your doctor says you have six months left to live.
Well, for some people, that six months, maybe three months.
For some people, that may be two full years.
It just depends.
It runs its course in different people in different ways.
And then you also have to want hospice.
So that's really it.
It's not a huge formal process.
It's not going to attorneys or anything like that.
It's just you need it and you want it.
Hospice steps in and we provide your nurse.
We provide your physician.
We provide a chaplain, a social worker, volunteers.
We provide aid services.
And we can do a lot of things that other places can't.
Each hospice has their own kind of set of we can do this and we can do this and we can
service this area.
But for Grace Hospice, we work beside your physician.
You don't have to give up your physician.
You don't have to sign a do not resuscitate.
You don't have to be willing to say, oh, I'm I'm ready to die.
I'm 100 percent ready to die.
Ready to go.
You don't have to be ready to die.
We're not here for for all of that.
We're here to make you comfortable.
We're here to make sure you're not in pain.
We're here to help you deal with family dynamics.
We'll even let you have some of the treatments that other places won't let you have.
You don't have to stop chemo radiation dialysis just because you're on hospice.
They do have to be palliative in nature rather than curative.
But if those treatments make you feel good and can help give you quality time with your
family, we are all about allowing you to do those treatments and we will stand with you
hand in hand beside you while you're doing that.
We'll coordinate with funeral homes.
We'll coordinate with your family members.
We've had nurses who have done face to faces on FaceTime with brothers who live in another
country, you know, trying to get them to, you know, see their their their brother for
the last time or, you know, arranging travel so that they can come see them and help take
care of them.
It's a full spiritual, emotional and physical journey that we will go with you and your
family for as long as it takes for as long as you're eligible and you still want hospice
to be here for you.
So it's more than just we're going to give you a medication and that's it.
You know, we're going to be there for everything.
We're going to be there to wash your hair, braise your hair, paint your nails, help you
put your Christmas tree up.
We want you to get to Christmas because we want you to be able to spend that time with
your family.
It's also about the spiritual needs, you know, do you have unfinished business?
Is there something we can help with there?
We can help put you in touch with different things, you know, different people in the
communities.
We can help arrange wheels on wheels and haircuts.
And as the disease progresses, we can be there for those things as well.
We can be there for you to help get you a hospital bed and to get you the oxygen that
you need and the medications that you need.
And we'll deliver them right to your door so that you don't have to worry about going
out.
We'll coordinate with your physician so that you don't have to make these appointments
in the middle of winter and, you know, deal with the weather and all of the other things
that you're going to encounter, all of the germs that you encounter, you know, we want
to keep you home too and comfortable so that you don't have to go to the ER.
We can take care of you in your home where you're most comfortable, where you want to
be surrounded by your family and friends.
And then at the end of life, at those last couple of days or weeks or moments, we're
there to hold your hand and hold the family's hands and say, you know, here's what's about
to happen.
Here's some education on what to expect next.
And you know, as soon as that moment does happen, call us and we'll be there for you
no matter what time of day or night it is.
We'll be there.
We'll make sure that your loved one looks beautiful.
We'll make sure that you've gotten everything picked up and taken care of.
We love to be able to go to the funerals of our patients, be able to say goodbye to the
families.
And then we also offer bereavement services that are available for 13 months after that
patient passes because grief doesn't stop once the funeral happens.
It goes on for a while.
And so we're able to really just take over for families so that families can be families
and be together and not have to worry about, did they get this pill and did they make this
appointment and do they need this?
And we do all of that for them so that they can just spend time together.
Yeah, Rachel.
And I think that's interesting because when I mean, like you were kind of saying earlier,
when I first heard about hospice care, it sounded very like clinical and mechanical.
Like you're saying grandma's on the brink of death, like it's coming.
How do we make her comfortable?
How do we get her her meds?
And then that's kind of it.
But what I'm really hearing you say is that it's from that diagnosis that you have this
amount of time left to live, this is the diagnosis, this is what's going on.
That's really when you and your and the individual wants care or the family wants care and assistance.
That's when you guys come in.
And it sounds like it's a lot more of a full service system than just the very basics.
And I think that's what's most admirable there is that it's not just the progression.
It's really filling up that life all around the Christmas trees, the communication facilitating,
I guess, those final wishes and even being there for the family after.
I think it's so important for people to hear that hospice care isn't just for the individual
that's going through that end of life period.
It's for all of those that are involved.
And I think that's so special and just needed in that situation.
Yeah.
And that's a great point to bring up, too, is that it's, you know, we're here obviously
for the patient, but part of the patient is their family.
And it may be that their family is their dogs or their cats or their fish or that it's their
home or or that it is, you know, a large group of people that are surrounding them.
And we do we take care of them all.
We find placement for pets and we feed their fish.
And, you know, we we we feed the souls of their loved ones because it you know, once
you've gotten that that word from the doctor that, hey, there's there's no treatment or
treatment is going to do more harm than good.
It's about the time left.
It's about making the time left quality time with those that you love in the place that
you want to be doing what you want to do.
Yeah, and it's just like you were saying, it's really about giving them that quality
time.
And I mean, when I was doing my financial coach training, just the idea of, you know,
life insurance and having these conversations with loved ones before they reach that point,
it takes the stress off of the situation to really let you focus on what's most important.
Like, we don't need to worry about the Christmas lights getting up.
We don't need to worry about how we're going to get to the hospital for these appointments.
We can because Grace Hospice is here, but we can focus on spending time with our loved
one on making those final moments really memorable without that extra baggage and stress of all
the other things that are going on.
Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely.
Yeah, and just to kind of start moving in terms of the Hospice Promise Foundation.
So Grace Hospice is the, correct me if I'm wrong, is the organization that does the work.
They're the one, the boots on the ground, your team that go out and make the magic happen.
And of course, for my walk, I'm raising money for the Hospice Promise Foundation.
How does the foundation tie in with the Grace Hospice entity?
Yeah, so and that's a great analogy.
So Grace Hospice is boots on the ground, providing those services, the clinical services, the
medication management, all of that.
And behind Grace Hospice is the Hospice Promise Foundation that is allowing us to do what
we call LONYOP.
It is a funny word that comes out of Louisiana, which is where our home company is based out
of.
LONYOP means to go the extra mile to do something that is unexpected or to give a gift that's
unexpected.
So our Hospice Promise Foundation allows us to go one step further in the care that we're
providing.
And the great thing about it is the money that we get here at Grace goes towards the
Grace Hospice Promise Foundation.
So it goes straight back into the communities and the patients that we serve.
And it goes to provide non-medical items for our patients and their families.
So rent assistance, grocery assistance, we've helped pay for funeral arrangements.
They're very, very expensive.
And if it's something that you are not planning for or something that it's unexpected, our
Promise Foundation can help to offset some of those expenses.
And we are able through the Promise Foundation to do some really, really cool things as well,
like grant final wishes and make some dreams happen towards the end of life.
So it's a really cool extension of the care that we're able to give here through Grace
Hospice.
Yeah.
And I think that's such an interesting point that it's the non-medical parts of the life.
And that's where the rent, the groceries, the final wishes.
And I was just curious, are there final wishes?
What have you guys done adding that magic to these people's lives at the end of it?
Do you have any specific examples of things you guys have been able to do that are out
of the ordinary or very special?
Yeah.
So one of the other organizations that I worked through, through LHC Group, through the Promise
Foundation, we had one specific incident that kind of sticks out in my mind.
And this is going to sound absolutely silly.
But you have to put yourself kind of in that mind space.
So we had a patient on service who was a biker, spent his whole life as a biker with his motorcycles,
long hair, long beard, kind of rough and tumble guy.
And he had told us that he had these last wishes.
And so he wanted to ride his bike again, of course.
And then he wanted to go to Hooters and have a beer.
And we just thought, well, that's simple enough.
Like, why not?
So we couldn't get him on a motorcycle, but we were able to get him in a slingshot.
And we took him to Hooters and his doctor said, absolutely, go for it.
Have a beer.
So we have all of these pictures of him with these girls, just huge grin on this old man's
face.
He just, you know, that was something that he was used to doing and he got to do it again.
And it just absolutely made him so incredibly happy.
There was another incident where we had a younger guy on service and he was in his young early
twenties.
And he said he had never been on a train or on a plane.
And the Hospice Promise Foundation was able to work with the community and we were able
to get him up in a plane and we were able to get him on a train that went through Arkansas
and it was a beautiful time of year where all of the foliage had turned.
And so he was able to take that ride with one of his best friends.
And so the Promise Foundation is able to do these really neat things through community
involvement as well to make these wishes come true as big and grandiose as they can be or
as small as just, you know, a trip down to Hooters.
That's so funny.
That's so interesting.
I think that's also just such a great wrap up to the conversation.
Like it doesn't have to be like you were saying, this grandiose, big, crazy thing.
It's really about those simple moments, those trips down to Hooters, that beer with friends,
that trip with a friend.
And I don't know why I'm so stuck on the idea of you guys helping with the Christmas tree,
but just those celebrations in life that are so easily taken for granted that are so special.
And I mean, that's why I'm so excited to be supporting you guys.
And I'm glad that we were able to kind of talk on the podcast for a little bit for you
to really just share hospice is more than just the basics.
It's it's about, I guess, maybe just sticking with that Christmas tree analogy.
It's not just putting up the tree.
It's putting everything on it that makes the tree so beautiful, helping with with rent,
helping with groceries, helping make those wishes come true, really just brings it to
the forefront of.
We are here to support you, your family from here to the end and beyond.
So I just want to acknowledge you for your work there.
And thank you so much for for everything that you do.
And yeah, I think that's fantastic.
Yeah.
And that was a great way to sum it up.
That's exactly that's exactly what we do.
Awesome, Rachel.
Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk with us today in terms of getting
in contact with Hospice Promise and Grace Hospice.
You guys are located specifically in Oklahoma.
How can people donate directly to you guys or work specifically with you if they're within
range of your guys' service area?
Yeah.
So Grace Hospice is actually a part of LHC group out of Lafayette, Louisiana.
We have offices in almost every state, which is absolutely amazing.
If you are here in Tulsa or the surrounding areas, we actually will service a 50 mile
radius from Tulsa.
So we go all the way up to almost the Kansas state line and we go all the way down to Henrietta.
If you're not from here, that doesn't mean anything to you.
But we service a 50 mile radius.
There are agencies all over the country and not just LHC group, but hospice in general.
If you are looking to refer to Grace, you can always give our office a call.
If you're wanting to volunteer, we are always accepting volunteers.
We have volunteers who work directly with patients, reading to them, singing to them,
painting nails, combing their hair.
And we also have volunteers who work here in the office making calls, doing administrative
work, that kind of thing.
Or if you're looking to donate money, that is also something that you can find on our
website, on our Facebook page, or to call here in the office and we can give you more
information on that.
Wonderful.
And I'll be putting all that information down in the show notes so people can follow you
on social media, check out the website, donate directly to you or to my fundraiser.
But Rachel, thank you again so much for your time and everything that you guys do.
I'm so excited to be supporting you and I'm excited to see all the fun wows and final
wishes and everything else you guys are able to grant.
So thank you so much for your time.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
We're so excited to partner with you on this opportunity.
Perfect.
All right, everybody.
Thank you so much for spending your time and investing a little piece of your day with
us here today.
Down in the show notes, I'm going to have all the information about Grace Hospice, the
hospice promise and everything else that Rachel and I talked about that may be interesting
to you.
I also put a couple of freebies down in the description so you can see what's going on
and you can start your journey towards building a life worth remembering.
Thank you again for all of your time and remember to have fun, stay safe and be yourself.
I'll see you all next week.
Bye.