Your family in San Antonio North deserves end-of-life care that keeps your loved one comfortable, supported, and surrounded by family at home. This deeply personal season deserves a steady presence, not confusion about who handles what. Preferred Care at Home works alongside your hospice team, providing caregivers throughout North Bexar County who help bring peace to patients and families.
We’ve been helping families since 1984, and our local office is owned by Jake Paulson right here in San Antonio.
Additionally, we use a 7-step caregiver screening process, and we are committed to matching caregivers based on compatibility, not just availability. Our team works to deliver reliable, caring support for our clients and their families. Family members get real-time access to schedules, caregiver notes, and updates through our Transparency Room.
When curative treatment ends and hospice begins, end-of-life care helps your loved one stay comfortable at home. Our caregivers support the comfort care plan your hospice nurse builds, with positioning, hydration, and comfort measures that ease pain between visits.
We don’t manage medications or provide medical care ourselves. We work under the direction of your hospice team so nothing falls through the cracks at home.
As strength fades, everyday tasks become harder to manage alone. Our caregivers provide personal care with assistance with bathing, assistance with dressing, and assistance with mobility, always with an eye toward dignity and independence.
Family members can step back from physical caregiving and simply be present as a son, daughter, or spouse again.
A hospice team typically includes a physician, nurses, hospice aides, social workers, chaplains, and trained volunteers, each covering a piece of care. Whether your loved one’s own doctor or a hospice physician leads the plan, our caregivers stay in the home and share what they observe.
We are not medical professionals ourselves, but we help create a vital connection between hospice patients, their families, and the care team.
For patients and their families, this season carries grief, fear, and sometimes relief, often all at once. Our caregivers offer emotional care through conversation, quiet company, or simply sitting nearby so no one faces the final days alone.
We respect each family’s spiritual traditions and never impose our own.
Family caregivers carry an enormous load during hospice. Caregiver burnout happens when one person handles all the meals, medications reminders, and overnight watching alone. Respite care gives you a break while a trained caregiver steps in.
Whether you need a few hours a week or overnight relief, private respite through our office can begin quickly and adjust as your needs change.
Your care journey begins with a single phone call.
Your care journey begins with a single phone call, and we walk you through every step.
Step 01
You call (210) 436-8713 and speak directly with Jake Paulson, your local owner.
Step 02
We visit the home to understand your loved one’s condition, routines, and what your hospice team has already put in place.
Step 03
We create a care plan that fits around hospice visits, family schedules, and what matters most in these final days.
Step 04
We match your loved one with a caregiver based on personality, experience, and comfort with end-of-life situations.
Step 05
Your caregiver starts, often within days, and you get Transparency Room access for schedules, notes, and updates.
North Bexar County’s growing senior population and the realities of hospice create specific challenges for families caring for a terminally ill loved one at home.
Challenge
What It Looks Like
How We Help
Growing senior population
What It Looks Like
About 283,300 Bexar County residents are 65 or older, and demand for in-home hospice support is rising.
How We Help
We serve San Antonio North with caregivers who live and work locally.
Challenge
Gaps between scheduled hospice visits
What It Looks Like
A hospice team visits on a schedule, but symptoms and needs shift between appointments.
How We Help
Caregivers provide presence and observation between hospice nurse visits.
Challenge
Confusion about care types
What It Looks Like
Families assume hospice covers around-the-clock in-home help, but Medicare’s hospice benefit funds the clinical team, not custodial presence.
How We Help
We explain what our non-medical support covers and how it fits alongside your hospice benefit.
Challenge
Family caregiver burnout
What It Looks Like
Around-the-clock caregiving for a terminally ill loved one exhausts even devoted family members.
How We Help
Respite scheduling gives family members real relief before burnout sets in.
Challenge
Isolation in the final days
What It Looks Like
Some patients spend long stretches without company while family works or manages logistics.
How We Help
Consistent, matched caregivers provide steady presence and emotional care.
Challenge
Dementia or cognitive decline alongside terminal illness
What It Looks Like
Memory changes can make hospice communication and daily routines harder to follow.
How We Help
Caregivers familiar with dementia support keep routines steady and preserve quality of life.
Driven by Passion, Committed to Compassion
Jake Paulson owns and operates this office himself, and he knows what good care looks like from the inside. That knowledge shapes how this office runs day to day. His standard is simple: the caregiver who comes to your home should be someone you’d trust with your own family.
Jake’s background informs how care plans are built, how caregivers are screened, and what families can expect when they call. This is a non-medical home care office. The care we refer centers on personal assistance, companionship, and the everyday support that makes staying home possible, but having spent decades in healthcare settings changes how you approach building that care.
We understand the needs of San Antonio North families and the surrounding North Bexar County neighborhoods.
We Serve:
Palliative care manages pain and other symptoms at any stage of a serious illness, alongside curative treatment. Hospice care is a specific type of palliative care for terminally ill patients, typically when a physician estimates six months or less to live. Preferred Care at Home provides non-medical support alongside either type of care, at home rather than in a facility.
Costs vary based on hours and service type, but San Antonio private-pay rates for non-medical home care typically run $20 to $30 per hour. Champion Care reports full-time non-medical care in San Antonio averages $4,000 to $5,000 a month, and live-in or 24-hour arrangements can carry lower per-hour rates. Each family’s situation is different, so give us a call to discuss a care plan that works for your budget.
Medicare and Medicaid both cover the Medicare Hospice Benefit for eligible hospice patients, including physician services, nursing, and medications related to the terminal illness. In 2024, 53.1% of Medicare decedents nationally were enrolled in hospice at the time of death. Non-medical hospice services like ours are typically private-pay and work alongside that coverage, and we walk clients through the cost during a free consultation.
CareScout’s 2025 Cost of Care Survey puts the Texas nursing home semi-private room median near $5,627 a month, close to the state’s assisted living median. Non-medical end-of-life care at home is typically billed hourly, so cost depends heavily on how many hours per week your family needs. For many families, part-time hospice support at home costs less than full-time facility care while keeping a loved one in familiar surroundings with family nearby.
We are locally owned by Jake Paulson, and every caregiver is screened through our 7-step process and matched by personality. When you call our office, you reach the owners directly, not a corporate call center. We coordinate closely with your hospice team so nothing about daily care falls through the cracks.
Most families begin care within days of their first call to our local office. We schedule a home consultation promptly, confirm a caregiver match, and build a care plan around your loved one’s condition and your hospice team’s guidance.
A hospice team usually includes the patient’s physician, a hospice physician or nurse, hospice aides, social workers, chaplains, and trained volunteers. Each covers medications, symptom management, and emotional or spiritual care on a scheduled basis. Our caregivers are not part of the medical team. We provide the in-home presence, personal care, and family support between those visits.
No. Medication management for a terminally ill patient stays with the hospice nurse and physician. Our caregivers can provide medication reminders for non-hospice medications and communicate concerns to your hospice team. Administering or adjusting hospice medications stays outside our role.
Texas licenses home care agencies as Home and Community Support Services Agencies (HCSSAs) through the Health and Human Services Commission. Personal Assistance Services caregivers complete agency-provided training and a skills check, and many of our caregivers also hold CNA or HHA credentials. We add our own 7-step screening on top of state requirements, including background checks and personality evaluation.
We offer flexible scheduling that starts at just a few hours, so you can get the break you need without committing to full-time care. Caregiver burnout during hospice builds slowly: missed sleep, skipped meals, and rising stress. Regular respite hours through Preferred Care at Home mean your loved one still has company while you recharge.
Yes. The Bexar Area Agency on Aging offers free benefits counseling, care coordination, and caregiver support for Bexar County families. Your hospice social worker is also a strong first resource for bereavement support and community programs. Preferred Care at Home is happy to point families toward these resources even before care begins.
Call (210) 436-8713 and talk directly with Jake Paulson. You don’t need a plan before you call. Many families reach out to Preferred Care at Home when caregiver burnout has already set in and daily tasks are falling through the cracks. We start with a conversation, assess your loved one’s needs, and build a care plan your family can adjust over time.
