Message from the Chair
&
Executive Director
Kathleen M. Foley, MD (USA)
Liliana De Lima, MHA (USA)
Dear readers:
Welcome to the March issue of the IAHPC Newsletter. We have several announcements:
1. IAHPC Recognition Awards:
We are pleased to announce that our selection committees have chosen the following winners of the IAHPC 2006 Recognition Awards:
a. Institutional Category: This year, for the first time in the history of this program, two programs were selected as winners of the Institutional Award. The committee felt that both deserved this recognition and therefore decided to give a prize to each.
The winners are:
Programa de Cuidados Paliativos Gobierno de Cataluña (Palliative Care Program, Department of Health, Government of Catalonia) Barcelona, Spain.
The Palliative Care Program of the government of Catalonia was selected as a winner of this year’s award as an example of excellent palliative care integrated in public policy. The program was put in practice more than 10 years ago as a WHO demonstration project. The Catalonia WHO demonstration project for Palliative Care implementation was designed jointly by the Catalan Dept. of Health and the WHO cancer unit as a means to provide a systematic implementation process for all types of resources in the health care system. The basic aims were to achieve public coverage for cancer and non-cancer patients that had accessibility, equity, and quality (effectiveness, efficiency), all of which could be used as a references for other ministries of health to rationally plan palliative care. The project also included all of the elements of a systematic approach: needs assessment, implementation of specialized services, opioid availability, education and training, research, quality assessment, financing systems, legislation (1990) and standards (1992), as well as indicators to monitor progress. www.hospicecare.com/Awards/2006inst.htm
Pain and Palliative Care Unit – Children's Hospital at Westmead, Sydney, Australia.
The Pain and Palliative Care Unit at Children’s Hospital is under the leadership of Dr. John Collins. The committee selected this service as recognition of the care that the unit has provided to meet the needs of children with pain and advanced progressive conditions. The group provides comprehensive multidisciplinary pain and palliative care through inpatient and outpatient services. Additional information about the service is available at www.hospicecare.com/Awards/2006instb.htm
b. Vittorio Ventafridda Award (Individual Category):
Dr. Robert Twycross (UK) is the author of nearly 300 articles, chapters and editorials on palliative medicine. Dr. Twycross received his medical training at Oxford and served as a fellow at London 's renowned St. Christopher's Hospice starting in 1971. He has taught and promoted palliative care in over 40 countries, he led the World Health Organization's Collaborating Center for Palliative Care from 1988 to 2005 and was the Academic Director of the Oxford International Centre for Palliative Care. His bio and photo can be seen here www.hospicecare.com/Awards/2006indv.htm
c. University Category:
American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) (USA)
The award was given to AACN in recognition of the extraordinary work by the End of Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) developed in 1999.
The AACN is the national voice for baccalaureate and higher degree nursing education programs in the United States . AACN advances nursing education, research, and practice by setting curriculum standards, building coalitions, supporting faculty and dean development, advocating for federal support, collecting data to shape public policy, and pursuing special educational projects in end-of-life/palliative care and geriatric nursing. AACN joined forces with the City of Hope National Medical Center to and developed the End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) project. The ELNEC training program was developed as a 2 ½ day train-the-trainer program with the intent that both undergraduate and graduate faculties would return to their universities to disseminate the information they had learned to their nursing students and other nursing faculty during future training courses. Additional information about the AACN and the ELNCE project is available at
www.hospicecare.com/Awards/2006univ.htm
Congratulations to the winners of these well deserved awards and for their outstanding efforts to improve palliative care around the World. We extend our many thanks to the committee members who worked hard at selecting the winners from a large number of applications. Additional information about the IAHPC Recognition Awards Program as well as past winners, is available in our website at http://www.hospicecare.com/Awards/
2. Traveling Fellowships and Scholarships
Two Traveling Fellowships were awarded to Dr. Douglas McGregor, Regional Palliative Care Medical Director and Nurse Patricia Porterfield, who are regional palliative care leaders of Vancouver Coastal Health, Canada . The award support their travel to Belize . Dr McGregor and Ms Porterfield were invited by Dr. Beatriz Thompson from the Belize Cancer Society and the Ministry of Health.
Five Traveling Scholarships have been awarded to support the travel of palliative care leaders from developing countries to participate in the 10 th Congress of the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) in Budapest, June 2007.
They are:
Dr. Sergio Conti – Medical Doctor, Hospice de la Frontera, Tijuana, Mexico
Dr. Jorge Eisenchlas – Director Palliative Care Service, Hospital Udaondo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
Dr. Maria Fidelis – Fellow Supportive Palliative and Hospice Care, University of the Phiipplines, Manila, Philippines.
Ms. Harmala Gupta – President and CEO, CanSupport, New Delhi, India.
Dr. Anil Kumar Paleri – Institute of Palliative Medicine, Pain and Palliative Care Society, Calicut, Kerala , India Dr. Rene Rodriguez – Director Pain and Palliative Care Medicine, Social Security Institute, Cali, Colombia.
Additional information about the EAPC Congress can be found in the EAPC website at http://www.eapcnet.org/budapest2007/
Congratulations to these outstanding leaders and palliative care workers for being awarded these grants. We hope their trips will result in long lasting changes in palliative care in their countries and we look forward to their reports after they return.
3. Meetings and Conferences
a. Past meetings:
IAHPC participated with a booth at the Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (AAHPM) and the Hospice and Palliative Nursing Association (HPNA) in Salt Lake City, USA between February 14 and17. This meeting has been growing in size during the past years and has become an important meeting for physicians, nurses and palliative care workers in the USA and increasingly from other countries as well. In addition to the booth staffed by Ana Restrepo, manager of IAHPC member services, Liliana De Lima participated in a panel on international palliative care initiatives chaired by Dr. Kathy Foley, with Dr. Frank Ferris, Medical Director of the Center for Palliative studies at San Diego Hospice, USA and Mr. David Joranson, Director of the Pain and Policy Studies Group at the U of Wisconsin in Madison, USA. This issue of the Newsletter includes photos of the booth and the session.
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| Left to right: Mr. David Joranson, director of the PPSG, Ms Liliana De Lima, our ED, and Dr. Frank Ferris in the panel chaired by Dr. Kathy Foley on International Palliative Care Initiatives at the AAHMP meeting. |
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| Our Chair, Kathy Foley and our ED, Liliana De Lima, with visitors to the IAHPC booth in the AAHPM meeting in Salt Lake City |
b. Future meetings:
WHO Essential Medicines – Geneva, Switzerland, March 19-23.
As we mentioned in past Newsletters and announcements, we will participate in the next WHO Expert Committee on Essential Medicines during which the IAHPC List of Essential Medicines for Palliative Care will be reviewed and discussed. We hope that the members of the expert committee will approve the IAHPC List as recognition that these medications are necessary to ensure the appropriate care of patients with advanced, progressive conditions. More information about the List and the process used to develop it is available in the IAHPC Website at www.hospicecare.com
Latin American Forum on HIV/AIDS – Buenos Aires, Argentina, April 2007
The Latin American and Caribbean Forum on HIV/AIDS is the most important meeting concerning this field in the region. The meeting is attended by more than 4,000 delegates and representatives of governments, patient care providers, patient groups and many others. We will be participating in a panel chaired by Dr. Jorge Eisenchlas on Palliative Care for HIV/AIDS during which we will underscore the importance of Palliative Care as a component of care for patients with HIV/AIDS. Also, we hope to establish contacts that could be helpful for the inclusion of palliative care in the next World AIDS meeting in Mexico City during 2008 and as part of the strategy of a group convened by the Wide World Palliative Care Alliance (WWPCA).
Until next month,
Kathy Foley, MD
Chair, Board of Directors
Liliana De Lima, MHA
Executive Director
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