Hospital gives patients space to bid farewell to loved ones

Making life's last journey with a dying patient is always a sad process and can be especially painful if the patient is in a crowded public hospital ward where privacy is a luxury.

Things are changing, at least at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Yau Ma Tei. The hospital's accident and emergency department has recently turned a treatment room into a special venue for families and friends to spend the last 24 to 48 hours with their loved one.

The room, called Osiris after the ancient Greek god of the underworld, is the first such facility of its kind in a local public hospital. Decorated as a private ward, the spacious room accommodates a patient's bed, a sofa, tea table and a big armchair. Family members can stay overnight there with the patient and religious rituals can also be held.

Since it went into service in mid-September, six patients have died there, most of them cancer patients admitted to the accident and emergency room after their conditions turned critical at home.

Accident and emergency chief Dr Ho Hiu-fai said promotion of end-of-life care had become a trend in the United States, while Hong Kong was still at the starting stage.

'In the past, family members had to squeeze around a patient bed in a general ward with no privacy at all in bidding farewell to the patient,' Ho said. 'Now they have a private area for that very last moment. So far the response has been good.'