CCCC In Action

Creating a Culture of Compassion - Register Now!

Register now for the 4th Annual CCCC Conference & Membership Meeting on February 15, 2012, at the Catamaran Resort & Spa in San Diego. Hear Myra Christopher, national expert in aging and end-of-life care, talk about healthcare reform. Find out the latest on Californians' end-of-life experiences and attitudes from Dr. Steve Pantilat, winner of the 2011 James Irvine Leadership Award. Click here for more information.

                                                                                          

CCCC Hosts National POLST Conference in February

In conjunction with our annual conference, CCCC is hosting Partners in POLST: Honoring Patient Wishes across Care Settings, a national POLST conference, on February 16, 2012. Join end-of-life and palliative care leaders from across the country to learn the latest on advancing the POLST Paradigm.

 

Judy Citko New Board President of the Culture Change Coalition

CCCC's Executive Director Judy Citko has been elected to serve as Board President for the California Culture Change Coalition. The Culture Change Coalition seeks to transform nursing homes into great places to live and work.

 

Community-Based Palliative Care

With support from the California HealthCare Foundation (CHCF), CCCC is working to develop recommendations to promote wider implementation of community-based palliative care services. The first step is a review and analysis of the current state of community-based palliative care.

 

New Resources in the Works

CCCC is currently developing brochures on hydration and ventilation to help patients make informed treatment decisions and to complement our popular CPR/DNR and Tube Feeding brochures. As part of the project, we will also develop resources to help parents of seriously-ill children make decisions about medical care. We'll keep you posted as the project moves forward.

 

Snapshot of Death & Dying - 2012

CCCC and CHCF are working together to update the 2006 Snapshot of Death & Dying in California. The new report, to be released at the CCCC annual conference, will include the results of a survey of over 1,600 Californians' views on issues related to end-of-life and palliative care.

 

Policy Update

New California Legislation

Governor Brown has recently signed two pieces of legislation into law that could impact end-of-life care in California.

 

AB 507 (Hayashi), sponsored by the Northern California Pain Initiative, addresses removal of obsolete or inconsistent language in the Intractable Pain Treatment Act. According to the American Pain Foundation, these policy changes will significantly address concerns of providers and remove the barriers to timely and appropriate treatment for people with pain.

                                                                                                                         

SB 177 (Strickland) also became law. To help eliminate long waiting lists for Santa Barbara County's only licensed hospice facility, this legislation increases the maximum number of patient beds allowed in a hospice facility in Santa Barbara County.

  

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News and Notices 

2011 Palliative Care Report Card Gives California a "B"

The study, America's Care of Serious Illness: A State-by-State Report Card on Access to Palliative Care in Our Nation's Hospitals, conducted by the Center to Advance Palliative Care (CAPC) and National Palliative Care Research Center (NPCRC), examines variation in access to palliative care at the state level in order to help both the public and policymakers increase the availability of these services for all people in need.

 

CA Hospital-Based Palliative Care Survey

UC San Francisco and the National Health Foundation are in the process of surveying all hospitals in California to capture the prevalence and characteristics of hospital-based palliative care services in the state. This survey, expected to be released in early 2012, will provide current data in follow up to a similar survey conducted about five years ago.

 

Support IOM Pain Recommendations

The American Pain Foundation and the National Fibromyalgia & Chronic Pain Association are asking for support as they petition the leadership of Health and Human Services and members of Congress to act on recommendations outlined in the Institute of Medicine's report, "Relieving Pain in America."   Learn more.    

 

Improving Palliative Care in Emergency Medicine

The Center to Advance Palliative Care has announced a new national initiative, IPAL-EM (Improving Palliative Care in Emergency Medicine) to integrate and increase the use of palliative care with seriously-ill patients who are admitted to the emergency department. To learn more, visit the IPAL website .  

 

 

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Education

2012 ELNEC Summit

End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) gives nurses and others the essential knowledge and resources in end-of-life and palliative care, so they are prepared to teach others. Four ELNEC train-the-trainer courses will be offered concurrently: Geriatrics, Core, Critical Care and Pediatric Palliative Care.

           Sponsors:    ELNEC, City of Hope and the American Association of Colleges of  Nursing

           Dates:          January 26-27, 2012

           Location:      Glendale, CA

           Cost:             $550 before December 10, $600 after

           Registration  

 

 

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