GLASGOW – Tours were given Tuesday during an open house for the new Shanti Niketan Hospice Home on Glenview Drive.

The hospice home consists of 10,400 square feet and offers eight rooms for terminally ill patients.

Among those giving tours was nurse Stacy Parnell of Tompkinsville, who said hospice care is something near and dear to her heart.

“Twenty years ago next month, my mom passed away with brain cancer, and I don’t know what we would have done without hospice, so that’s why I am a hospice nurse,” she said.

Parnell, who wasn’t a nurse when her mother had cancer, has been involved with hospice since plans for Shanti Niketan were first drawn.

“I wanted to be here when it opened and became a reality, and we got to start meeting the needs of the community, so here I am,” she said.

Each patient’s room at Shanti Niketan features a micro-refrigerator, a sofa than can be converted into a bed, a private bathroom, ceiling-to-floor windows to let in natural light and large double doors so patients can be taken out onto private patios, even when in bed.

The hospice home also features a large living room and kitchen, a spa, a meditation room and a prayer room. There is also a room that has been designed specifically for bariatric patients.

Among those who toured the hospice home was Laurie Steele. “It’s absolutely beautiful. I think it’s going to be great for the … patients and the families. I love the design of it. It’s great to have it here,” she said.

Former Glasgow Mayor Dick Doty also took a tour.

“This is a great thing for our community. It’s such a needed facility for families in such an important time,” he said.

Neil Thornbury, chief executive officer of the T.J. Community Mission Foundation’s board of directors, said the community needed a hospice home.

“We’re all very excited about this. It’s been work and kind of a culmination of about six years of the community and a lot of donors and a lot of people dedicated to make sure something like this could happen,” he said.

End-of-life care is something that is very personal to each person and their family. Typically, families have two options: They can receive hospice care in the hospital or at home, Thornbury said.

“What happens in most cases in the home is people really are challenged with the health care the patient needs. Having this type of facility, (we) will be able to work with the families and help them with the transition during the end of life. They will have somebody who will be able to take care of the medical portion, the health portion. … It provides that location of caring and comfort in that final stage of life,” he said.

Throughout the hospice house is stained glass art created by Dr. Bharat Mody, a retired general surgeon and local philanthropist.

Mody is the lead philanthropic supporter for the hospice home and the one who chose its name. In Sanskrit, shanti means inner peace and niketan means a place, Mody said.

The idea to build a hospice home in Glasgow belongs to the T.J. Community Mission Foundation’s board of directors. The construction of the hospice home was funded in part by donations.

“Once I knew what they wanted to do, I got on the front line to help them, support them because I think this is something so wonderful, so beautiful for our terminally ill patients and their families of our community and surrounding communities for years to come,” Mody said.

The T.J. Community Mission Foundation received a loan from the U.S. Department of Agriculture in June 2019 to apply toward construction. The loan can be paid back over 10 years.

The total estimated cost of the hospice home is $3.45 million. So far, $2.5 million has been raised.

“That loan that we got from USDA kind of gave us the last nudge we needed to get over the hump so we could actually break ground and actually start building the building,” said Stacey Biggs, executive vice president of marketing, planning and development for T.J. Regional Health.

An opening date is not yet scheduled, Biggs said.

Included on the final list of things to be done before the hospice home opens is a state inspection and acquiring a certificate of occupancy.

“As recent as yesterday … they were putting finishing touches on paint and that sort of thing. Still, just a few last things we need to do before we can open. So, it will be soon,” she said.

The hospice home was constructed in a way so that it could be expanded.

“If we needed four more rooms there would be a third wing that could be built off the back of the building, so we could expand to 12 (rooms) if we needed to do that,” Biggs said.