|
Message from the Executive Director
Liliana De Lima, MHA (USA)
Dear readers:
As you know, Dr. Kathy Foley is completing her term as Chair of IAHPC at the end of 2007. It has been a wonderful experience to work under her leadership and I am very grateful for all her support and encouragement. During Kathy’s term we were able to do many things, two of which include securing additional funding to support our programs and operations and to complete a List of Essential Medicines for Palliative Care, which has proven to be a useful tool for palliative care workers around the world. I will always be grateful for her trust and mentorship during these past years.
In addition to Kathy’s term ending, the term of several of our Board members will be completed by the end of the year: Gian Domenico Borasio, Eduardo Bruera, Nathan Cherny, Neil MacDonald, Daniela Moisoiu and Jan Stjernsward. Many of them participated actively in working committees, provided helpful guidance and advice, and secured funds to support our office. It has been a privilege to work with them.
I also look forward to working with Roberto Wenk, who, as you know, has recently been elected as the new Chair of IAHPC. If you wish to read more about Roberto, please read our last month’s Newsletter or click on his bio in our Board of Director’s page: http://www.hospicecare.com/Organisation/Org.htm#BOARD
Please remember that we are accepting nominations for six seats in our board of directors. This newsletter includes the information about requirements for nomination and a link to the page where you may cast your nomination.
For many of you, this time of the year also means the end of your membership. Please remember to renew your membership so that you may continue helping us help others. Applications for new memberships or renewals can be found in http://www.hospicecare.com/join.htm
As part of our mission to work on effective interventions and projects to promote policy and educational changes in hospice and palliative care in the world, we recently participated in a workshop at the Universidad de la Sabana in Bogota. It was organized by the Fondo Nacional de Estupefacientes (FNE) of the Ministry of Health in Colombia. During this workshop, the participants identified the barriers to the availability and accessibility of opioid analgesics and proposed strategies and solutions to overcome these barriers. The organizations participating in the workshop included the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the World Health Organization (WHO), the French Safety Agency for Health Products (AFSSAPS), the WHO Collaborating Center in Pain and Policy Studies Group at the University of Wisconsin, the Colombian Pain IASP Chapter and the Colombian Association for Palliative Care. Six strategies and solutions were proposed by the group at the end of the two days and they will be presented to the Ministry of Health for their review and application. We hope that this workshop will lead to significant improvements in opioid availability in the country. We will also be able to measure the effectiveness of this workshop as a possible model to achieve concrete results for other countries of the world.
I recently returned from a large congress of pharmacists in Panama City, Panama where more than 900 participants from Central America and the Caribbean were present. The first two plenary sessions of this large congress were on access to pain relief and palliative care - this is a measure of progress. However, many of them had never heard of palliative care before and only a few were familiar with the Analgesic Ladder. Much remains to be done and we need to keep working hard so that palliative care becomes a familiar word and concept among health workers. Many thanks to Dr. Rosa Buitrago, professor at the School of Pharmacy, for her invitation and her efforts. I hope this will be the beginning of great changes among her peers.
Best wishes to all of you, your friends and family members for the coming holidays and hope that next year will be a happy and successful one.
Until next month,
Liliana De Lima, MHA
Executive Director
Top of Page
|
