Thank you for contributing to the Improve Quality of Life-Palliative Care Education campaign.
IAHPC focuses on advancing palliative care through our educational programs.
Your donations to this campaign have assisted us to expand our programs to include advocacy webinar courses, the upcoming Global Leaders in the Advance and Development (GLAD) of Palliative Care program, Global Directory of Palliative Care Educational Programs, Opioid Price Watch, palliative care essentials and competencies as well as our traveling scholarship program.
The IAHPC educational programs reach our members throughout the world. The location of the IAHPC members are:
Thanks to you, these educational opportunities directly affect patient care and contribute to the development of palliative care policies in our members’ countries.
Thank you again for your support,
The IAHPC Team
Nguyen, a palliative care physician and oncologist from Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, received an IAHPC Traveling Scholarship grant to attend the Palliative Care Education and Practice (PCEP) Program at Harvard Medical School, Massachusetts, US, earlier this year.
In the March 2017 Project Report, we shared his experiences on the first part of the program. Having now completed the program, he explains how he has put into practice what he learned.
Can you remind us why you applied for an IAHPC grant?
Nguyen: As a palliative care physician, oncologist and teacher, I realized the importance of communication skills - for sharing information with my patients and their families, for teaching medical students and younger physicians during their placements in our palliative care department, and for my lectures on the annual palliative care basic training program at our hospital. However, I lacked confidence in my communication and teaching skills, since we had no specific training for these in medical school. I thought that the PCEP would give me the skills to improve my efficiency as well as to share my knowledge with other palliative care practitioners.
Can you tell us how you have begun to put new skills and learning into practice?
Nguyen: After the first part of the PCEP, I taught on some basic palliative care training courses for physicians and nurses in Ho Chi Minh City Cancer Hospital and in local hospitals in central and southern Vietnam: ethics in palliative care, decubitus and malignant wound care, communication and case presentations. Hopefully, our young physicians can now grasp the principles of palliative care, such as pain and symptom control, breaking bad news, and apply these to their daily practice.
Some local hospitals were interested in using opioids to control pain and dyspnea and how to manage adverse effects of opioids, and were eager to use these skills after the course. Many young physicians spend their training time in our department, and I instruct two to three physicians every two months.
What are your take-home messages from the program?
Nguyen: Part two of PCEP enabled me to consolidate and enhance the skills I had acquired previously.
Communication skills - will help me deal with conflict in family meetings, in difficult situations such as responding to the expectation of a miracle when a patient is reluctant to talk about it, and how to hold a family meeting. In Vietnam, due to shared-decision-making, we usually have to talk to the many relatives and friends of a patient before we reach a goal of care, and there's often conflict among family members. Patients are often the last ones to know about their own diseases and prognoses, since their families are afraid that bad news will be bad for them.
Teaching skills - since teaching seems to be my part-time job, the teaching topics of PCEP part two will, I hope, allow me to give my audiences a more interesting and productive lecture that they can easily understand and apply to their practice. And the "How to give constructive feedback" or "Being a one-minute preceptor"should help me provide effective mentorship to younger physicians.
How has the program helped you to overcome some of the barriers and challenges In Vietnam that you discussed in our last interview?
Nguyen: As palliative care's influence is expanding in our country, more people realize the importance of symptom control as well as psychosocial issues. But we still have many barriers and challenges, particularly: Lack of essential medicines; lack of public and professional awareness; lack of specialist staff (we still have only physicians and nurses in our department), and lack of support from insurance companies (many drugs, eg. oral oxycodone, topical metronidazole, are not covered). Also, patients have to pay personally for home care services.
The first step to overcome these issues is to expand the understanding of palliative care concepts through teaching and training. I would hope that PCEP has enabled me to improve my teaching skills - not only to better share my knowledge but also to inspire others to see the necessity and meaning of our work. Most hospitals where we have delivered training have now begun to store oral morphine in their pharmacies and integrated palliative care into their daily care (mostly cancer care).
As the number of palliative care practitioners grows in our country, and more people become aware of the same issues that we have now, then our voices and actions will bring greater influence.
On behalf of our scholarship recipients and the entire IAHPC team, thank you for your generosity and making the Travel Scholarship Program possible.
Warm regards,
IAHPC Team
Links:
Ganesh, a physician from Nepal, was one of the 18 healthcare professionals who received a traveling scholarship to attend the 12th Asia Pacific Hospice Conference (APHC) in Singapore.
"Palliative care in Nepal is grossly inadequate with only a few institutions providing basic palliative care in the capital city and none at all in small towns and suburbs.... There is a significant lack of trained professionals in the field, and a shortage of pain and palliative care specialists. However, informal training and advocacy workshops are being delivered, mainly with the help of local and international non-governmental organizations...Everyone should have access to excellent care during the course of a serious illness and at the end of life.
Participating in the Asia Pacific Conference enhanced my knowledge, skills, and technical expertise and will enable me to provide excellent clinical care to our patients...giving me the opportunity to attend was an important milestone in the development of the healthcare system of Nepal."
On behalf of our scholarship recipients and the entire IAHPC team, thank you for your generosity and making the Travel Scholarship Program possible.
Links:
Samy is a palliative care physician and professor of clinical oncology in Egypt where the shortage of oral morphine is a major barrier to the development of palliative care.
"With the support of the IAHPC, I was fortunate to attend the EAPC 2017 World Congress in Madrid. It was an opportunity to discuss with international palliative care experts from around the world how to promote palliative care and cancer pain control in Egypt through education and advocacy.
Faced by many barriers, palliative care is at an early stage of development in Egypt with relatively few services providing palliative care for cancer patients. Morphine is the drug of choice for moderate/severe cancer pain control and is considered an essential medicine by the World Health Organization... My attendance at the congress, gave me the chance to discuss the morphine shortage problem with international experts... Likewise, there was a chance to communicate with palliative care professionals from my own region: Kuwait, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia and Sudan; in particular we discussed research opportunities to address the palliative care needs in our cultures."
On behalf of our scholarship recipients and the entire IAHPC team, thank you for your generosity and making the Travel Scholarship Program possible.
Warm regards,
IAHPC Team
Links:
Sunita has worked as a physician at Shree Birendra Hospital, Chhauni and Kathmandu, Nepal, for the past 17 years. She received a traveling scholarship to participate in the 15th World Congress of the European Association for Palliative Care in Madrid, Spain. This was Sunita’s first international palliative care conference.
“In Nepal, the concept of palliative care is still new; it is limited to only a few centers and deals mainly with pain and other symptom management.
“My poster: ‘Limitations in Chronic Pain Management and Efficacy of Alternative Modalities during Mega Disaster in an Underdeveloped Nation’ (pictured above), was based on pain and palliative care during disasters. Nepal is disaster-prone and many people are disabled due to natural and human-made disasters, as well as the decade-long conflict. I attended a presentation about the inclusion of people with disabilities in palliative care research. Such initiatives would be useful in our situation too. One of the drawbacks in Nepal is the maintenance of databases and research and with my newfound knowledge I want to advance palliative care research in Nepal.”
On behalf of our scholarship recipients and the entire IAHPC team, thank you for your generosity and making the Travel Scholarship Program possible.
Warm regards,
IAHPC Team
Links:
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