Tom. Cat, judge people

Meet this Tom - cat who lives in Virginia hospice for veterans. Tom - full-time employee of the hospice, his duty is to spend time with patients and maintain their morale when they go to the other world.
Tom lives in the palliative care unit at the Medical Center of veterans in Salem, Virginia, where he helps to create a more homely atmosphere and talks to elderly veterans. Tom May 2012 taken from the shelter. Doctors have been inspired by the idea to get a cat specifically for hospice patients, as many have heard of successful applications felinoterapii in other institutions, such as in a nursing home, which contained patients with Alzheimer's disease.





Physicians and coordinators wanted to find the right cat for such a responsible business, as a consolation of dying patients and they turned for help to surrounding shelters. And in one of the shelters found Tom. According to the staff - it was a perfect candidate for this important position. He really was the ideal cat!

Hospice - this is a very sad place. All patients and staff there daily faced with death. And, of course, people know that will never go out of there. In this regard, it is doubly hard to see around them public walls. Doctors tried to help Tom make patients more homely ambience and enjoyable. And they were right, taking shelter from the volume name.



We saw with our own eyes the impact that Tom has on patients, their families, and even our employees, "the doctors say. "Tom brings a calm and normal life in our department." "Families do not want their loved ones feel alone, and it is comforting for them to know that there is Tom. Surprisingly, many families did notice that Tom is coming to be with their family members, when they die, he just goes with his family in the room, heading straight to the patient collapses on the bed and carries with him his last hours. "

The daughter of one of the deceased in this case the hospice patient tells how Tom kept dying. The patient was surrounded by family and friends during his last hours, and Tom curled up next to him in a hospital bed. In the last minutes, Tom put his paw in the hand of the dying and did not clean it, even after his death.



"I would never have believed that someone could just touch my heart, as it did this cat, but I really felt that God spoke to me in that day through Tom," says Ms. Thompson - "This it was as if God was Tom paw hand leading up to the pope bright skies, just the way I wanted him to go away, quietly and calmly. I left the hospice with a smile on his face and love in my heart, knowing that my father is now on the way to a new world, and it happened with the help of Tom the cat. "



Herndon family was thrilled when I saw Tom in a hospice, where their father got a veteran of both world wars and the Korean War, Kenneth Francisco in November 2012. He has already developed dementia and he suffered a series of strokes. Tom was a regular visitor to his chambers.
"It was like coming home, if the house was open, that Tom was certainly there," says Ms. Herndon. "Every time we were there, Tom was with him.»
After his father's death, Ms. Herndon was so inspired by the work of this cat that has written a book about the experience of his family keeping father and about the role of Tom in this experiment. "Tom, the cat angel" - a story for children, illustrated by Connor Jones, pyatiklassnitsey whose artwork raises money for charity.

"This is my way to honor my father," - says Ms. Herndon in her book - "Tom woke me inspiration. I really wanted to do something for the hospice for the difficult and very necessary work they do every day. They really helped me and my family! ».

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