Many thanks to those of you who attended Hospice Palliative Care Ontario’s annual conference at the Sheraton Parkway Toronto North Hotel and Convention Centre from Sunday, 29 April 2012 to Tuesday, 1 May 2012. Select session handouts are now available for attendees, and delegate lists and additional post-conference information will be shared shortly. Please visit our conference website for more information.
From Sunday, April 29 to Tuesday, May 1, 2012, HPCO was proud to host its annual conference. Although it was a celebration of our work and a wonderful opportunity to reconnect with colleagues, it was also tinged with sadness as we learned of the passing of Elizabeth Latimer on Saturday, April 28, 2012.
Dr. Latimer was a champion of hospice palliative care, and an icon within our movement. Her friendship will be missed, and her international impact on the field of hospice palliative care will be felt for years to come.
A memorial book was provided courtesy of our friends at Dignity Memorial, for people attending the conference to sign. Please visit their online obituary for more information on Dr. Latimer and her legacy.
The 2012 Annual Hospice Palliative Care Ontario Conference is just six days away! Our registration desk will open for business at 8:00 AM on Sunday, 29 April 2012, the first day of what we expect will be our biggest and best three-day conference yet. If you haven’t yet registered, please be sure to do so as soon as possible.
Are you on Twitter? Be sure to follow us @hpcontario. You can also use the #hpco2012 hashtag to keep on top of the latest news and developments, and to share your conference experience in real time this weekend. See you there!
Who would make decisions for you if you could not speak for yourself?
Hospice Palliative Care Ontario, along with many other national, provincial and territorial organizations, is encouraging Canadians to think and talk about their wishes for end-of-life care on Monday, 16 April 2012, which is National Advance Care Planning Day.
“Imagine, one day, without any warning, you find yourself in a hospital in a life-threatening situation, unable to communicate,” says Sharon Baxter, Executive Director of the Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association (CHPCA) and a member of the Advance Care Planning National Task Group. “ Who would speak for you and make health care decisions on your behalf?”
Advance care planning is a process of reflection and communication about personal care preferences in the event that you become incapable of consenting to or refusing treatment or other care. Your plan may include information about procedures such as CPR and mechanical ventilation, as well as other personal information, such as spiritual preferences or specific wishes for family members or friends.
One of the most important aspects of advance care planning is naming and having a conversation with a Substitute Decision Maker – someone who will speak on your behalf and make decisions for you, but only when you are not able to do so yourself. Research has shown that advance care planning significantly reduces stress, depression and anxiety in family members and caregivers who know your wishes and can act with confidence on your behalf.
Visit the Speak Up website at advancecareplanning.ca, which features a number of tools and resources to help Canadians make a plan and start the conversation with others.
“As health care technologies and life saving interventions continue to improve and people live longer – many with complex medical conditions – advance care planning becomes increasingly important,” says Ms. Baxter. “We need to communicate our feelings around the use of certain procedures at the end of life, and what we believe gives our life meaning. These are personal, individual choices that every Canadian deserves at the end of life. Make sure your voice is heard.”
Hospice Palliative Care Ontario celebrates National Caregiver Day!
“There are only four kinds of people in this world: those who have been caregivers; those who currently are caregivers; those who will be caregivers and those who will need caregivers.” Rosalynn Carter, former First Lady of the United States.
Each year, April 5th is a day for family and informal caregivers – family, friends, neighbours – to be acknowledged and celebrated. 23% of Canadians say that they cared for a family member or close friend with a serious health problem in the last 12 months. A sincere thanks to all caregivers for your kindness and compassion!
To read more about caregivers click here for a Family Caregiver Fact Sheet
HPCO in partnership with the Provincial End-of-Life Care Network and the Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association has launched Speak Up Ontario! to promote advance care planning. Thirty individuals from across the province and representing each LHIN region attended a train-the-trainer session with Louise Hanvey, the Project Manager for Advance Care Planning in Canada at the Canadian Hospice Palliative Care Association. The goal of the project is to train and equip local health service staff and volunteers to start the conversation with clients about advance care planning. Regional EOL/HPC networks will coordinate seminars and speaking engagements in their area. To support this initiative, HPCO will be offering another training opportunity at the Annual Hospice Palliative Care Ontario Conference on May 1, 2012. For more information on this initiative, please contact your Hospice Palliative Care/End-of-Life network director.
We are pleased to announce Dr. Jeff Myers as the 2012 Carmelita Lawlor Lecturer. Dr. Myers will be presenting “Our Time Has Come: Lessons Learned from the Cancer Experience“. The HPC community currently finds itself with an unprecedented opportunity for both literal and philosophical integration much earlier in the care trajectory of patients living with advanced illness and their caregivers. Key enabling factors include the emerging accountability of organizations/institutions for the measurement, evaluation and improvement of “the patient/client & caregiver experience” and the increased level of chronicity associated with most illnesses. The HPC community must take the lead and guide the system wide paradigm shift toward person-centred care as historically this perspective has served as the foundation for all HPC professional activities. This presentation will both outline the lessons learned from the HPC-oncology simultaneous model of care delivery and explore how the HPC community could and should position itself as the leader in applying these lessons to other health care contexts.
Members of the hospice palliative care community participated in a video produced by GlaxoSmithKline Inc. to thank their employees for many years of support to hospice palliative care in Canada. GlaxoSmithKline Inc. (GSK) employees chose hospice palliative care as the company’s cause of choice in 1997. Since then, the company has spearheaded a number of initiatives to assist the three million Canadians who care for terminally ill family members. GSK recently undertook a leadership role in corporate Canada by promoting compassionate care programs for employees and demonstrating the value of such programs for corporations. Please take a moment to view the short video and learn more about the impact of GSK and their employees on hospice palliative care.
Advancing High Quality, High Values Palliative Care in Ontario. A Declaration of Partnership and Commitment to Action.
In April of 2011 at the Annual Hospice Palliative Care Ontario Conference, the Hon. Deb Matthews, Minister of Health and Long-Term Care, committed to a province-wide review of hospice palliative care. After three months of intense engagement with stakeholders the review was competed on 8 December 2011. We are pleased to share with you a copy of the Declaration of Partnership and Commitment to Action, the initial output of the provincial hospice palliative care review initiated by the Ministry of Health and Long-Term Care. For details, please refer to our full review update.
Two of the keynote speakers are confirmed for the 2012 Annual Hospice Palliative Care Ontario Conference.
Dr. Alejandro (Alex) Jadad (MD, DPhil, FRCPC, FCAHS) will lead the opening keynote presentation on Sunday, 29 April 2012, which will be entitled “Supporting Each Other in the Age of Social Media: Could Death Be, Truly, Our Friend?” Dr. Jadad is the Chief Innovator and Founder at the Centre for Global eHealth Innovation; the Canada Research Chair in eHealth Innovation; and Professor at Departments of Health Policy, Management and Evaluation and Anesthesia at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health.
Dr. Richard A. Swenson (MD) will lead the closing keynote presentation on Tuesday, 1 May 2012, which will be entitled “The Margin Prescription: Restoring Balance and Reserves to Busy Lives.” Dr. Swenson is a physician-futurist, best-selling author and award-winning educator. As a physician, his current focus is cultural medicine, researching the intersection of health and culture. As a futurist, his emphasis is fourfold: the future of the world system, western culture, faith, and healthcare.
