7 Key Hospice Nurse Interview Questions to Ask
Hospice nurses specialize in providing end-of-life care to patients who have six months or less to live. These nurses help patients feel comfortable and at peace, rather than try to extend their life through curative measures. This specialty requires a high level of compassion and patient-centered attentiveness, so asking specific hospice nurse interview questions is key to finding the right person for this role.
Beyond knowing what to ask during the interview process, it’s important to understand how to evaluate a candidate’s answers. We’ll walk you through seven essential interview questions that will help you bring the best hospice nurses onto your team.
Interview Questions for a Hospice Nurse
Hospice care is a specialty that attracts new grads and senior nurses alike, so it’s important to keep these questions focused on the skills of the job rather than specific experience. These seven essential hospice nurse interview questions will help you assess the qualities that are necessary for this role.
If you’re more specifically looking for hospice admission nurse interview questions, we recommend selecting questions that focus more on communication and interpersonal skills.
1. Why do you want to be a hospice nurse?
This is a great question to start the interview because the candidate can share more about their personal career journey. Additionally, you can get a sense of their motivations behind pursuing hospice care. Since this is an emotionally intensive nursing specialty, it’s important for candidates to be here for the right reasons.
Listen for answers that showcase a genuine passion for helping patients during their end-of-life stages. If a candidate doesn’t have a clear idea of why they’re pursuing hospice care, this may be a red flag since they could be unaware of the emotional demands of the job.
2. Describe some ways in which you feel that palliative care differs from curative care.
This is a more technical question that assesses how familiar candidates are with hospice care practices. While candidates are not expected to have expert knowledge of palliative care, they should have some understanding of how it differs from curative care.
At baseline, a candidate should be able to acknowledge that end-of-life care must be approached differently than other types of care. Or, they should demonstrate a willingness to learn and adapt if they’re coming from other specialties.
3. How would you handle difficult conversations around death with a patient or their family members?
For hospice nurses, understanding how to hold difficult conversations around death is a crucial skill. This question assesses how candidates might approach these complex but necessary conversations, or their attitudes toward having them.
Listen for answers that convey a candidate’s ability to remain patient and respectful in difficult situations. If candidates seem off-put by this question or caught off guard, this may indicate that they’re not quite prepared to provide hospice care.
4. Tell me about a time that you had to advocate for a patient’s needs to the rest of the care team.
As hospice is centered around enhancing the quality of a patient’s end-of-life care, it’s important for nurses to advocate for a patient’s needs. There may be times when a patient’s preferences are overlooked by the care team — this question assesses how a nurse might handle these scenarios.
Pay attention to how candidates discuss or perceive the importance of patient-centered care. A good answer will showcase a nurse’s willingness to advocate for patients while staying within their scope of practice and maintaining a professional relationship with their colleagues.
5. What steps do you take to incorporate a patient’s cultural and spiritual preferences into their care?
When drafting hospice nurse interview questions, it’s important to include at least one that addresses cultural competency. This question assesses the candidate’s sensitivity toward cultural and spiritual preferences, which are important aspects of end-of-life care for many patients.
A candidate’s answer can clue you into their overall attitude toward spiritual and cultural diversity. If they seem unwilling to learn or stay open minded about different beliefs, they may not be well-suited to provide individualized, end-of-life care.
6. What strategies do you use to meet a patient’s needs while respecting their emotional boundaries?
Hospice care requires a delicate balance between supporting patients and respecting their boundaries. Nurses must stay cognizant of how patients are feeling in order to meet them where they are emotionally.
Listen for answers that indicate the ability to individualize communication with each patient. Candidates should understand that hospice care requires ongoing flexibility since patients’ needs and wants can fluctuate.
7. How would you emotionally support families who are grieving the passing of a loved one?
Hospice nurses must also be comfortable consoling family members after the passing of their loved ones. This question allows you to assess a candidate’s knowledge on the grieving process and how they might approach these situations.
Candidates should be aware that their responsibilities stem beyond the end-of-life period for each of their patients. Listen for answers that showcase a candidate’s ability to convey empathy and compassion for all individuals involved in a patient’s care journey.
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