Personal Calling

LCFH’S Gwen Whitley was drawn to hospice care

When GWEN WHITLEY was introduced to LOWER CAPE FEAR HOSPICE about twelve years ago, she embarked on a journey that has provided both vocation and avocation.

And, since November 2016, she has led the organization that made such an initial impression that it changed the course of her career.

“I was working in home health care and was a vice president,” she says. “I was quite happy in home care – thought I’d retire from that field – and then I had a hospice experience.”

A good friend with breast cancer entered hospice care and spent about two months with hospice services in her home.

“I began to see (LCFH’s) wonderful work, preparing her for death but also embracing her husband and six-year-old daughter,” Whitley recalls. “Then, she was transferred to the care center (at LCFH’s headquarters in Wilmington).

“I witnessed the most beautiful death I had ever seen. There’s nothing beautiful about the fact that she died, but in the moment, what I saw was a peaceful, beautiful death,” Whitley continues.

Driving home, Whitley told her husband, “I want to be a part of this organization.”

Two years passed before LCFH had an opening that suited Whitley’s skills and experience as a nurse and administrator. She joined the organization in July 2008 as vice president of clinical operations and was serving as LCFH’s chief operating officer when she was named CEO.

It’s evident that the mission of hospice has become a consuming passion for Whitley. But, she says she is not alone in this: Staff members share core values and work effectively in interdisciplinary teams.

“Employees who come to work here generally stay,” she says. “Is it a calling? Maybe not everybody recognizes that at first, but after a while, they realize it is. Our employees are truly committed to caring for our patients and do it with such compassion and empathy.”

Whitley emphasizes that LCFH’s impact reaches beyond the 700 or so patients and their families it serves each day in six North Carolina and three South Carolina counties.

“Our mission is to serve anyone touched by life-limiting illness so that everyone can die with dignity,” Whitley says, adding that a patient’s ability to pay for hospice services is not a consideration. LCFH provides about $1 million each year in free hospital services.

Non-medical services range from art and music therapy to massage therapy and help around the house.

To help after the death of a loved one, families are eligible for bereavement services for up to twelve months, Whitley says. Those services include counseling for family members of all ages, support groups, and Sunshine Camp – open to any youngster affected by a death, even if hospice was not involved.

Whitley volunteer by preparing food as part of Meals of Love, provided to family members who visit their loved ones in LCFH’s three care centers. She also serves on the state board that oversees home health care and hospice organizations.

The CEO has mapped out several ambitious goals for the organization.

“Of course the need for more funding is always there,” she says. “The way we are able to provide bereavement care is through the support of the community: from donations and memorials, from events we host, and from a group of large gift donors who have decided … that hospice is the organization they want to support.

“I would love to see us expand our community education efforts; it’s my dream to build an education center, teaching people how to care for a loved one and how to prepare advance directives and do funeral planning. One of my pet projects is Alzheimer’s care – those caregivers are almost underwater with the demands of their loved ones.”

One project already in the works, Whitley says, is looking at how people should prepare themselves emotionally, legally, and physically for the death of a loved one.

“There’s a tremendous amount of help we in this agency could do,” she says.

To view more of photographer Katherine Clark's work, go to www.katherineclarkphotography.com.