Hospice & Palliative Care Profiles

 

Dr. Sanaz Kashan is the Founding Fellowship Program Director of Hospice and Palliative Medicine at Aventura Hospital and Medical Center and also serves as the Transitional Year Residency Program Director. Currently she is a Palliative Medicine Physician for Catholic Palliative Care Services. Dr. Kashan is board certified in Internal Medicine, Geriatrics Medicine, and Hospice and Palliative Medicine.  She is an Assistant Professor at Florida International University Herbert Wertheim School of Medicine (HWCOM). Active in many medical organizations, Dr. Kashan serves on multiple committees within the American College of Physicians, American Geriatrics Society and American Association of Hospice and Palliative Medicine. Dr. Kashan’s career interests have been end-of-life care and advanced care planning, topics she has presented on at the local, state, national and international level. Dr. Kashan is passionate about enhancing quality health care through medical education and inter-professional teamwork to improve health outcomes.

 

 

Gisell Hernandez serves as an Advanced Practice Registered Nurse for Catholic Palliative Care Services at Mercy Hospital. In 2017, Hernandez joined our Palliative team, initially providing services to patients and families in the community, before playing an integral role in launching needed palliative services at Mercy Hospital. She has dedicated the last two decades to using her practical nursing skills to advance the health and well-being of patients who receive her care. Throughout her tenure in healthcare, Hernandez’s experience spans administrative capacities, cardiology, skilled nursing care, intensive care, case management, and hospice services. Hernandez is goal directed and results driven which benefit her patients through her advocacy. When she is not working, she enjoys spending time with her family.

 

 

Carlie Jean-Louis, R.N., is a case manager for Gold Coast Home Health & Hospice at Broward Health, where she is committed to ensuring quality and consistency of care for all patients. Jean-Louis works closely with each patient and their physician to develop a plan of care specially tailored to meet the needs of each individual patient.

 

Compassionate and thoughtful, Jean-Louis is inspired by serving others and considers it a privilege to be involved in the lives of her patients. Throughout her 13 years at Broward Health, she has been devoted to her patients, embracing her role and collaborating with her team to consistently address the needs of her patients and their families.

 

Jean-Louis studied business administration at Hofstra University in New York and graduated with a degree in nursing from St. Petersburg College in Florida. She volunteers her time serving the homeless through Calvary Chapel’s initiatives and programs.

 

 

Mark Leager, MSPT, has been a home care and hospice physical therapist for Gold Coast Home Health & Hospice at Broward Health for 14 years, providing physical therapy services to patients in-home and in-hospice care at Broward Health Medical Center. Leager is responsible for admitting, evaluating and treating patients, as well as supervising ancillary healthcare staff involved in the patient’s plan of care. He is intricately involved in the patient’s continuum of care, assessing their home for safety and recommending equipment.

 

Leager is in communication with physicians and serves as a liaison during the transition of care for additional services to optimize a patient’s functional independence. With a unique insight into the world in which his patients navigate, Leager is committed to improving their functional mobility and independence while uplifting their spirits. His compassion and genuine spirit shine as he celebrates his patients’ accomplishments and their determination to meet their goals.

 

Leager earned his Bachelor of Science and master’s degree in physical therapy from Neumann University in Aston, Pennsylvania.

 

 

After working for seven years as an intensive care trauma nurse, Sasha Noble “felt right at home” when she joined VITAS in 2019 as an admissions nurse for the newly opened Treasure Coast program, providing care throughout Martin, St. Lucie, and Okeechobee counties.

 

“I tell other nurses that this why I became a nurse,” Noble says. “Hospice really personifies all the values we learned in nursing school, all the reasons we wanted to become nurses. We actually help our patients, and we listen. In turn, VITAS supports us as nurses so we can support our patients and their families.”

 

Providing care during COVID-19 has been both challenging and rewarding, she says, especially when hospice nurses serve as critical connections between patients and family members who cannot visit their loved ones. “From a nursing home or care facility, we can call the families and say, ‘We’re here with your mom. She’s eating her breakfast. She’s nice and clean, and she’s doing fine.’ That means so much to the families, and they know we care about their family members as much as they do.”

 

 

 

A South Florida respiratory therapist for 25 years, Omar Rodriquez shifted his career’s focus from acute care, sub-acute care, and durable medical equipment after his father-in-law’s 2017 death from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and other underlying conditions.

 

“When I saw how the VITAS team took care of him, it struck me that hospice was a field of respiratory care that I had never considered,” says Rodriquez, who also worked as an X-ray assistant and physical rehabilitation assistant before pursuing a career in respiratory therapy.

 

“Seeing death is never easy, but to be able to use my expertise to support patients and families at that very moment, to make them comfortable and help them with every breath, is very rewarding,” he explains.

 

In addition to patient care, Rodriquez oversees educational protocols for respiratory equipment and disease-state management, including employee training and in-service programs on respiratory therapy for patients with advanced illness at local hospitals, physicians’ offices, and care/rehab facilities.

 

 

Samuel Chandran joined VITAS as a hospice chaplain in 2014, after working with Compassion International, a child sponsorship and Christian humanitarian aid program, and serving as a pastor of an international church in Minneapolis. He was born in Chennai, India, and moved to the US in 2007. A fellow pastor piqued his interest in chaplaincy and pastoral care.

 

“I have always been drawn toward the elderly, the sick, the needy, and the vulnerable. Clinical pastoral education emboldened the pastoral call in my life and made me realize that hospice is what I’m made for, this is my calling,” Chandran says.

 

“The aspect of hospice care that I love is that every person has a story. To sit at the bedside and hear those stories, to walk that memory lane with patients and cherish those moments…that’s what’s important and what I always cherish. I always go in thinking I have something to give, and I come out realizing that I’ve receive much more from my patients.”

 

In addition to his work at VITAS, Chandran is working with international physicians to start hospice programs in India.

 

 

MaryAnn Watson is certain that her 25 years of experience as an oncology nurse prepared her well for her transition to hospice care in 2013 as a performance improvement specialist for VITAS.

 

“I’ve always loved working closely with people, and I’ve always loved education,” Watson says. “That’s what nursing is: educating patients on the disease process and self-care, and educating caregivers to care for their loved ones. Education reduces fear, builds confidence, and eases anxiety. It makes for a stronger relationship.”

 

Today, she educates VITAS care teams, trains new employees, and is a strong advocate of hospice’s multidisciplinary approach to care.

 

“For every person who has a terminal illness, the patient and the entire family need hospice, not just for the physical symptoms but also for coping with stress and anxiety, for the emotional and spiritual aspects of losing someone. We bring in a whole team that specializes in that kind of interdisciplinary care. Hospice is a calling, a service. It makes patients feel that they’ve made the right decision by choosing hospice care.”

 

 

Elisa M. Halliley, M.M., MT-BC, joined MorseLife Hospice and Palliative Care as a bereavement coordinator and music therapist in 2019 and is also currently serving as the intake coordinator for the palliative care program connecting patients with services in the community-based program. During the pandemic, she continues to provide supportive counseling to bereaved families and offer music therapy services to patients in hospice and their families. Elisa’s near decade of related experience includes providing music therapy to elementary school students with developmental disabilities as well as patients in outpatient substance abuse and rehabilitation settings and memory care facilities. Board certified, she served on the Florida Music Therapy State Task Force for three years. Elisa received her Master of Music in Music Therapy from Florida State University where she had also graduated with a Bachelor of Music in Music Therapy.

 

 

Teri Sasse, R.N., M.S., serves as the assessment nurse for the palliative care program at MorseLife Hospice and Palliative Care. Her responsibilities include connecting patients with care as well as with additional community resources. Teri also helps patients better understand their condition and medical care including educating patients regarding their medications. With 37 years of experience in nursing and the health care industry, she is passionate about informing the community about palliative care and available health options. Before joining MorseLife this year, she served as a clinical nurse 3 on an orthopedic unit at Atrium Health in Concord, North Carolina. CPR and IV certified, Teri received her bachelor’s degree in nursing from Florida State University before earning her Master of Science in Adult Health Nursing as a clinical nurse specialist at Georgia State University.

 

 

Dr. Melanie Skelton serves as the lead Palliative Care Physician for Catholic Palliative Care Services at Holy Cross Health. Dr. Skelton is known for her collaborative approach to enhancing patient outcomes through multidisciplinary team involvement. Dr. Skelton is board certified in hospice and palliative medicine, as well as internal medicine. Prior to moving to South Florida in 2019, Dr. Skelton’s healthcare career spanned from surgical coordinator to hospitalist to attending physician. Dr. Skelton’s leadership continues to build trust and confidence in Holy Cross Health’s palliative care services within the community. She is well known and appreciated for her kind approach, warmth, sincerity and radiant smile, seen in even the most challenging of healthcare circumstances. Outside of her professional career, she enjoys spending time with her family. She is a proud wife and mother to her two sons.

 

 

Art Hoff currently serves as the Palliative RN Navigator for Catholic Palliative Care Services at Holy Cross Health. He is instrumental in keeping the program running efficiently and in providing compassionate care to patients and families. Beginning as a pediatric nurse, he has since served in many diverse clinical settings such as rehabilitation, orthopedics, travel nursing and providing nursing services for inmates in a federal correctional institute. After losing his long-term partner in 2010 to colon cancer, Art turned his focus to palliative medicine. Since then Art has used the experience of being a family member dealing with loss to bring an extremely personal touch to those in need. Using his own loss as a tool to help others is a hallmark of the care Art provides, and he is an outstanding patient and family advocate to everyone, including the most vulnerable people in our South Florida community.