Wings, the BJC Pediatric Supportive Care Program

Through Wings, the BJC Pediatric Supportive Care Program, children with a potentially life-limiting illness receive extraordinary care and their families receive extraordinary support. The program meets a range of physical, emotional and spiritual needs. 

Wings provides nurturing and supportive services in the home to improve quality of life for both the patient and the family. Children may continue to receive their prescribed medical treatment with an additional focus on relieving the symptoms and managing pain. Wings transitions the child to the home setting after prolonged hospital care, coordinates care for the child at home and supports the family after the child's death. 

Wings:

• Maximizes love and quality of life
• Minimizes pain, fear and uncertainty
• Offers  continuity of support to family members, so they may live as normally as possible
• Provides creative activities through which the child and family can express their grief
• Ensures continuity of care by providing familiar professionals who provide services as needed

The Wings team is comprised of highly skilled specialists trained in hospice and home health supportive care. The team is deeply committed to providing everything needed to guide children and their families through the crisis of illness and/or dying in a way that minimizes pain, fear and uncertainty.

Children may qualify for the Wing Program if they:

• Have a progressive or advanced disease with acute exacerbations
• Are 21 years of age or younger
• Live within a 50 mile radius of St. Louis, Missouri
• Require extra support to remain at home as much as possible
• Have a significant deterioration in medical condition(s) within the past six months
• Have decreased ability to perform routine activities
• Have multiple hospital admissions over the previous six months
• Are unable to rebound to pre-hospitalization status
• Have a need for pain and/or symptom management
• Have a family that wants to maximize quality of life
• Have caregivers who need psychosocial, spiritual and emotional assistance

Services
An array of services enables family members to lead their lives as fully as possible. Services for children and adolescents through age 21 are available 24 hours per day. An interdisciplinary pediatric specialty team takes a holistic approach to care, providing:

• Nursing services
• Pain and symptom management
• Guidance in navigating community resources
• Medical social services
• Spiritual support
• Therapy services for patient safety and family education
• Volunteer services
• Bereavement support
• Expressive therapies
• Home health aides and homemaker services

Perinatal Hospice Program
The Wings Perinatal Program fills a void for those parents who will give birth to an infant with a terminal condition. Wings assists the families cope by creating a bridge from pregnancy to parenthood to bereavement. 

An interdisciplinary specialty team, in conjunction with the family and medical team, develops a personalized care plan that addresses the family's goals during pregnancy, delivery and the time following the baby's birth. The program allows for a continuum of supportive care for mother and baby from the time of fetal diagnosis until the death of the child. They can help plan arrangements, memorial services and good-byes at the hospital or at home. They can assist parents in identifying community resources available to them, including support groups and resource materials. Follow-up care and support is provided to the parents and siblings. 

• Uses imagery as an aid in healing
• Assesses and explores death awareness
• Determines the child's emotional, social and psychological functioning
• Uncovers feelings or conflicts that the child or sibling is having difficulty verbalizing
• Provides an appropriate outlet for expressing thoughts and feelings
• Develops a supportive, trusting and therapeutic relationship
• Assists the bereaved family work through the painful process of healing
• Allows the patient and family to gain some relief from physical or emotional stress

Wings On Wheels
Wings on Wheels (W.O.W.) was created to take expressive therapy into the community. A brightly colored van is ready to roll, going where it's needed -- to schools, scout meetings, churches, homes and neighborhoods -- to connect our expressive therapy to children and families in the metropolitan St. Louis community where they live, learn and play.

A specially trained expressive therapist leads creative activities to help children explore their thoughts and feelings, celebrate life and honor relationships.  Learn more about Wings On Wheels >

Watch a Video About Our Expressive Therapy Program

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A mom, who is also a nurse, explains the importance of using Expressive Therapy to address the emotional needs of family members when a child is in hospice.
Young patients and their families use Expressive Therapy to identify, examine and share their feelings while with a serious and life-limiting illness.