Week #1 - There’s light at the end of the tunnel for America’s end-of-life care
Robert Milch, M.D., is the Medical Director at the Center for Hospice and Palliative Care in Buffalo, New York and is Associate Clinical Professor of Surgery and Adjunct Assistant Clinical Professor of Family Medicine at the State University of New York at Buffalo School of Medicine and Biomedical Sciences. He has published widely on the subjects of pain and symptom management, ethics, and palliative care in surgery. Dr. Milch was a founding officer of the New York State Cancer and AIDS Pain Initiative and serves on the Sub-committee for Long-term Care and Hospice of the New York State Medical Society.
J. Donald Schumacher, Psy. D., is President and Chief Executive Officer for The Center For Hospice and Palliative Care in Buffalo, New York. He is presently a member of the National Hospice & Palliative Care Organization
(NHPCO) Board of Directors and is the chair of the Children’s Hospice International Task Force. Dr. Schumacher also serves as chair of the NHPCO Nursing Home Task Force and is co-convener of the Last Acts Task Force on Institutional Innovation. He is currently the Director of Public Policy for Partnership For Caring.
Week #2 - It's time to talk: Most important conversations are the hardest to have
Dale G. Larson, Ph.D. is Associate Professor, Department of Counseling Psychology at Santa Clara University. A clinician and former Fulbright Scholar, Dr. Larson has published extensively in the end-of-life, counseling, and health psychology areas. He is the author of
The Helper's Journey: Working With People Facing Grief, Loss, and Life-Threatening
Illness.
Week #3 - Bereaved partners left with hardest question: Who am I now?
Myra Christopher is President and CEO of Midwest Bioethics Center (MBC) in Kansas City, Missouri. Ms. Christopher is National Program Director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's national program, Community-State Partnerships to Improve End-of-Life Care.
Week #4 - Palliative care relieves physical, emotional pain
Russell K. Portenoy, M.D., is Chairman, Department of Pain Medicine and Palliative Care, Beth Israel Medical Center, and Professor of Neurology, Albert Einstein College of Medicine. He is a Trustee of the American Board of Hospice and Palliative Care, past president of the American Pain Society, and Secretary of the International Association for the Study of Pain. Dr. Portenoy is Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Pain and Symptom Management, and author or editor of 12 books and more than 350 papers devoted to the fields of pain management, symptom assessment, opioid pharmacology, and palliative care.
Week #5 - How to control your healthcare at the end of life? Write the ultimate directive
Robert A. Bendiksen, Ph.D., is professor of sociology and, since 1997, director of the Center of Death Education & Bioethics at the University of Wisconsin-La Crosse. Dr Bendiksen serves on the Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center’s Institutional Review Board and as Secretariat of the International Work Group on Death, Dying, and Bereavement. He has recently coedited several books including
Death and Identity, Third Edition (with R. Fulton), Death, Dying & Bioethics (with G. Cox), and
Complicated Grieving and Bereavement (with G. Cox and R. Stevenson).
Bernard Hammes, Ph.D., is the Director of Medical Humanities for the Gundersen Lutheran Medical Foundation and the Gundersen Lutheran Medical Center in La Crosse, Wisconsin. His work as chair of the Institutional Review Board and Ethics Committee has resulted in two nationally recognized programs on advance care planning:
If I Only Knew... and Respecting Choices. He has authored or co-authored numerous articles and book chapters that are focused on clinical ethics, advance care planning, and end-of-life issues.
Week # 6 - Doctors and patients need to speak the same language to bridge cultural divide
LaVera Crawley, M.D., is a Lecturer at the Stanford University School of Medicine in Palo Alto, California and the Executive Director of the Initiative to Improve Palliative and End-of-Life Care for African Americans. Dr. Crawley has served as Project Director for Research on Cultural Diversity and End of Life at Stanford's Center for Biomedical Ethics. She is a former Soros Faculty Scholar for Project on Death in America and has published extensively regarding cultural barriers to end-of-life care.
Week #7 - In death, spirituality can deepen meaning of life
Martha Rutland-Wallis, D. Min., is Director of Clinical Pastoral Education at VITAS Healthcare in Miami, Florida and a United Methodist minister.
Hugh Maddry, M.Div., DRE, is the Deputy Director of the Veterans Health Administration's National Chaplain Service. Dr. Maddry has served as Adjunct Faculty at a number of theological seminaries as well as on the faculty of the East Tennessee State University Quillen College of Medicine. Prior to his career with the VA, Dr. Maddry was a Director of Pastoral Care for a large Regional medical center and a Pastor for several United Methodist churches in Virginia and North Carolina.
Week #8 - Grief, faith and farewell: Last rites say ‘I was here’
Thomas Lynch is a poet, essayist and funeral director. Mr. Lynch is an adjunct professor of creative writing at the graduate writing program at University of Michigan. He has written extensively on end-of-life issues. His collection of essays,
The Undertaking (W.W. Norton, 1997) won an American Book Award and was a finalist for the National Book Award. His most recent book is
Bodies in Motion and at Rest.
Week #9 - Living on the edge: Baby boomers faced with caregiving dilemma
Karen Orloff Kaplan, Sc.D., is the President and Chief Executive Officer of Partnership for Caring: America's Voices for the Dying (PFC). Dr. Kaplan has special expertise in health and aging issues, and in developing health and social policy. Dr. Kaplan's previous academic positions included posts as Clinical Instructor at Tufts University and the University of Cincinnati School of Medicine.
Ira Byock, M.D., is Director of The Palliative Care Service in Missoula, Montana, Director of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation national program, Promoting Excellence in End-of-Life Care and is a Research Professor in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Montana. He is the co-founder and principal investigator for the Missoula Demonstration Project, Inc, Dr. Byock is the author of
Dying Well: The Prospect for Growth at the End of Life and co-author of
A Few Months to Live.
Week #10 - Patient and family needs at core of hospice care
Stephen R. Connor, Ph.D. is Vice President for Research and Professional Development at the National Hospice & Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO) in Alexandria, VA. He has published journal articles, reviews, and book chapters on issues related to the hospice movement and care of dying patients and their families. He is the author of
Hospice: Practice, Pitfalls, and Promise.
Week #11 - Nursing homes are last stop for most Americans
Muriel R. Gillick, M.D. is the Physician-in-Chief at the Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for Aged in Boston, Massachusetts. She is also an Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Gillick has written extensively on the topics of decision making near the end of life and ethical and clinical issues in geriatrics.
Len Fishman is President and CEO of the Hebrew Rehabilitation Center for Aged in Boston, Massachusetts. He is trained as an attorney and early in his career served as General Counsel for the New Jersey Association of Non-Profit Homes for the Aging.
Week #12 - When a child is dying: Smallest patient offers biggest lesson
Bruce Himelstein, M.D., is Director of Palliative Care Services at the Children's Hospital of Wisconsin and Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Hematology/Oncology at the Medical College of Wisconsin. He is co-investigator for a National Institute of Health grant to research parental beliefs in pediatric oncology and is a member of the Children's Oncology Task Force on End-of-Life Care, and the Bone Tumor Strategy Group. Dr. Himelstein is board certified in Pediatric Hematology and Oncology and by the American Board of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.
Joanne Hilden, M.D., is the Chair of the Department of Pediatric Hematology/Oncology and Children's Oncology Group (COG)
Responsible Investigator at the The Children's Hospital at
The Cleveland Clinic, Cleveland, Ohio. She founded and co-chairs the COG Task Force on End-of-Life Care. Dr. Hilden is a 2001 Soros Scholar in the Project on Death in America, and she is a certified trainer for the American Medical Association’s EPEC project to educate physicians about end-of-life care.
Week #13 - Violent and unexpected deaths leave trail of ‘secondary victims’
Charles A. Corr, Ph.D., is Professor emeritus, Department of Philosophical Studies, Southern Illinois University Edwardsville. Dr. Corr is a member of the Executive Committee of the National Donor Family Council and the International Work Group on Death, Dying, and Bereavement. Dr. Corr has written over sixty professional articles and book chapters. His most recent book is
Death and Dying, Life and Living.
Week #14 - Living with loss: Bereaved swim against tide of grief
Marcia Lattanzi-Licht, RN, MA, is a consultant and maintains a private
practice in Boulder, Colorado. Ms. Lattanzi-Licht has published widely in the
areas of coping with professional stress, loss and bereavement care. She is
the principal author of The Hospice Choice: In Pursuit of a Peaceful Death.
Week #15 - A vision for the future: Taking control at the end of life
Dan Tobin, M.D., is a palliative care physician consultant integrating advanced illness/end-of-life coordinated care programs within the VA Healthcare Network Upstate NY and the VA New England Healthcare System and is the Director of the Center for Advanced Illness Coordinated Care. Dr. Tobin has authored training manuals and health service research articles focusing on the integration of advanced illness/end-of-life care within health plans and health systems. He is the author of
Peaceful Dying: The Step-by-Step Guide to Preserving Your Dignity, Your Choice and Your Inner Peace at the
End-Of-Life.
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