By Sue Boucher | Project Leader
The ICPCN has a mission to achieve the best quality of life and care for children and young people with life-limiting conditions, their families and carers worldwide and a vision of a world where every child and young person with life-limiting or life-threatening conditions and their families can receive the best quality of life and care regardless of which country they live in.
Our recently published research revealed there are 21 million children in the world today with palliative care needs, 8 million of which need specialised palliative care. But barely 5% of these 21 million children are accessing services. Many lower and lower middle income countries offer either no children's palliative care, or services that are localised and provide care to a limited number of children.
How then do we achieve this seeming 'mission impossible'? How do we realise our vision of a world where the quality of life of these 21 million children is improved, where they and their families are expertly and holistically supported through the course of their illness and, where needed, their deaths? We are convinced that the only way we are going to reach these children is by educating the people who care for them.
Just one healthcare professional trained in children's palliative care can positively affect the lives of 300 hundred or more children each year as well as the members of these children's families.
ICPCN has provided free face to face and e-learning training to around 3,000 people in over 120 countries, potentially touching the lives of more than a million children. It's a start but we know we need to do better than this.
Education can bring palliative care to every corner of the globe which is why the ICPCN has a strong focus on providing training of children's palliative care in the form of courses, workshops, master classes, confrences and seminars and on developing and improving our free online e-learning courses.
Will you continue to partner with us in this endeavour? Every dollar, pound, euro, rand, peso, shilling, rupee, krone, dinar, or whatever currency you use, that you donate to this project will help us to extend and expand our training of health care professionals in children's pallaitive care.
A doctor we trained in Nambia once told us, "Working with children with cancer has opened my eyes to the need for palliative care in Namibia. This workshop is a prayer answered. My fears and lack of confidence to address issues that are sensitive have been addressed. I hope to do better at work and to continue growing in knowledge."
We are so grateful for each donation already received. We are indebted to you and want you to know that you are helping ICPCN make our vision a reality.
Please would you consider another once off donation or even better a small, monthly donation to this ICPCN cause - even as little as $5? Many small donations could make one enormous difference in the lives of the 21 million children who are the reason for our organisation's very existence.
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