Hospice Foundation of America
E-Newsletter
Volume 7, Issue 11
November 2007
http://www.hospicefoundation.org
November 2007
- Message from David Abrams, President/CEO
- Focus on: Interview with Margaret Clausen, California Hospice and Palliative Care Association
- What's New @ HFA's Hospice and Caregiving Blog
- Hospice and Family Caregiver Resources
- HFA Salutes America's Veterans
- Living With Grief: Children and Adolescents
- Host a Downlink Site!
- Call for 2008 LWG Book Cover Art
- What’s New@ HFA
- Upcoming Conferences and Educational Opportunities
Message from David Abrams, President/CEO
Hospices have always been on the forefront of offering community support during times of public tragedy and loss. But the October wildfires in Southern California served as a difficult reminder that, as hospice staff scramble to help patients and families, their own homes and lives may be directly impacted by the tragedy as well. HFA was approached by Margaret Clausen, Executive Director of the California Hospice and Palliative Care Association, to support hospice staff and families who had been affected, and we were glad to assist. HFA has been proud to support hospices during past efforts in other public tragedies, after Hurricane Katrina, flooding in North Dakota, and Hurricane Andrew in Florida, and we hope that our resources and efforts will continue to support the good works that hospices do every day in their communities.
Focus on: Interview with Margaret Clausen, California Hospice and Palliative Care Association
Ms. Clausen knows first-hand how hospices in California have coped during these difficult weeks. HFA talked to Ms. Clausen about the fires and other issues facing members of CHAPCA, the partnerships the organization is forming to address these challenges, and the opportunities that lie ahead.
What’s New @ HFA’s Hospice and Caregiving Blog
In September, HFA unveiled the Hospice and Caregiving Blog (http://www.hospicefoundation.org/blog) with the goal of gathering and disseminating information useful to professionals and consumers from a single destination. Our goals are to inform, offer support, and generate online comments about important end-of life issues. Read some of the blog’s most recent postings:
Vincent Chiles, a hospice supervisor in Pennsylvania, writes about how experiencing the death of an aunt led him to work in hospice care.
Myra MacPherson, member of the International Work Group on Death, Dying and Bereavement and a HFA board member, offers a cogent examination of hospice care for The Washington Post.
Dr. Kenneth Doka shares his thoughts on "When is Medication Appropriate for Grief?"
Hospice and Family Caregiver Resources
HFA celebrates those who work in hospice during National Hospice Month. HFA has some excellent resources that you can use to shatter myths about hospice care, and to promote the concept of hospice in your area.
HFA also honors family caregivers during National Family Caregivers Month (NFC Month) is designated as a time every year to thank, support, educate and celebrate more than 50 million family caregivers across the country currently providing an estimated $306 billion in "free" caregiving services. This year NFC Month will focus on family caregivers speaking up for their rights. The National Family Caregivers Association has a number of materials online.
HFA Salutes America's Veterans
The Department of Veterans Affairs has been working to integrate hospice care into the VA system for over 20 years. Under the VA Tricare benefit, every veteran is entitled to hospice care, and hospice and palliative care consult teams now operate at every VA health care facility. Information about hospice and palliative care benefits can be found at the VA website.
More information about the Tricare benefit can be found on HFA's website.
Through local referral networks, the VA draws on the resources of the local communities in which it operates. One program that is actively addressing end-of-life needs for veterans in many states is the National Hospice Veteran Partnership (HVP) Program.
HVPs are coalitions of Veterans Affairs (VA) facilities, community hospices, end-of-life care or community organizations and others, working together to ensure that excellent end-of-life care is available for our nation’s veterans and their families.
In honor of Veterans Day, VA Acting Secretary Gordon Mansfield stated, "At the Department of Veterans Affairs, we are proud to fulfill the solemn pledge of President Abraham Lincoln who, during his second inaugural address on March 4, 1865, set forth our obligation to care for those injured in body and spirit in their defense of our Nation and for the families of those who made the ultimate sacrifice." HFA applauds the VA's commitment to extend this promise of care to the end of life.
Living With Grief: Children and Adolescents
HFA's 15th annual National Bereavement Teleconference, Living With Grief: Children and Adolescents, will be broadcast Wednesday, April 16, 2008. HFA's 2008 Teleconference will focus on the experience of grieving children and adolescents and the ways that hospice professionals, teachers and school administrators, grief counselors, funeral directors, and parents can best support these populations as they cope with loss and grief. The program and newly published book will focus on the most current theories and practices in this area, and as always will combine academic research with hands-on ideas for use in hospice support groups and other settings.
The teleconference will be moderated again by Frank Sesno, an Emmy-award winning journalist, special correspondent with CNN and a faculty member George Washington University’s School of Media and Public Affairs. Panelists will include:
- Kenneth J. Doka, PhD, MDiv, Professor of Gerontology at the graduate school of The College of New Rochelle and Senior Bereavement Consultant to HFA
- Nancy Hogan, PhD, RN, FAAN, distinguished professor and associate dean for research at Loyola University--Chicago
- Rita Milburn-Dobson, MA, RNC, FT, founder of Precious Gems Supportive Services (PGSS)
- Laura Olague, M.Ed., CT, executive director and co-founder of the Children’s Grief Center of El Paso
- Stacy Orloff, EdD, vice president of Palliative Care and Community Programs of the Hospices of the Florida Suncoast
- J. William Worden, PhD, ABPP, co-principal investigator for Harvard's Child Bereavement Study, based at Massachusetts General Hospital.
Registered sites can be found on HFA's Find-A-Site database.
This list is updated on a weekly basis so if there isn’t a site near you, please check back in a few days.
Site Coordinator Registration has begun! The Site Coordinator registration form is available from a link on the homepage of our website, or directly here.
This year, you can register and pay the materials fee online with a credit card. Alternatively, you may download the application from HFA's website and mail it to us with a check, money order, or credit card to our Washington, DC address.
After we receive your registration and materials payment (still $25 per downlink site if you register on or before December 20), you will receive a detailed Site Coordinator’s Manual in the mail and a password to access teleconference materials on our website.
If you haven't done so before, HFA encourages you to consider hosting a downlink site for the 2008 teleconference. Read some FAQs about the teleconference to learn about the benefits and the technical requirements of hosting. Please contact us at telecon@hospicefoundation.org if you have any questions or need more information.
Call for 2008 LWG Book Cover Art
"It is this ability of art to serve as a witness to our pain, to show the depths and profundity of our lives, that gives it as much of its therapeutic power as ridding the body of uncomfortable feelings or illuminating our darkest fears." (from Virginia Lynn Fry, "Part of Me Died Too", in HFA's Living With Grief: Children, Adolescents and Loss.)
Last year, we featured artwork, submitted by Harry Hynes Memorial Hospice, on the cover of our teleconference book. Receiving art for the cover was so rewarding, and the response from our readers so positive, we're starting the process again for our 2008 book. If you work with children or adolescents, or have colleagues who do so, please look over the submission information below. We look forward to seeing the wonderful work that you do in helping children and adolescents cope with grief and loss.
HFA is calling for submissions of grief-related artwork by children and adolescents. One piece of artwork will be selected as the cover image for HFA's 2008 book, Living with Grief: Children and Adolescents. Artwork must be the original work of a child or adolescent under the age of 21 and must be received by HFA by November 30, 2007. There will be a $500 honorarium provided to the artist whose work is selected for the book and a $250 honorarium provided, if applicable, to the hospice, school, or other organization that facilitated the artist’s work.
For more information on the submission process, visit here.
Subscribers to Journeys--A Newsletter to Help in Bereavement, should notice a new fresh look and format. The content is as helpful as ever, but the newsletter is now designed in a more contemporary, easy-to-read style. The newly designed Holiday Journeys Issue is available for 20% off the regular price until December 1. The Holiday Issue is a great way to let your bereavement clients know you're thinking of them this holiday season. Order online here. To order via mail, print and return this order form (PDF). You may also fax the order form to 202-638-5312. Orders must be placed in quantities of 25. All other redesigned special issues -- Anniversary, Newly Bereaved, For Kids by Kids, Understanding Support Groups and Helping Young People -- are also available.
On Saturday, Nov. 17, the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention (AFSP) will sponsor its ninth annual National Survivors of Suicide Day, reaching out to those who have lost a loved one to suicide. The day of conferences will connect survivors through a satellite and Internet broadcast, allowing survivors to share their experiences of loss. All local conferences will join in the broadcast (1-2:30 p.m. EST), which will offer emotional support to survivors of suicide loss and information about resources for healing. The broadcast will feature a panel of experienced survivors and mental health professionals. Please click here to find a conference site near you. The 90-minute program will also be broadcast on the AFSP website from 1-2:30 p.m. eastern time, with a live online chat immediately following the broadcast. The program will also be archived on the website for a full year afterwards.
The Compassionate Friends Worldwide Candle Lighting in memory of all children who have died regardless of age or cause of death will be held Sunday December 9 for one hour starting at 7 p.m. local time around the world. More than 400 services, including several by local hospices, will be held in the United States. Find the latest listing of Worldwide Candle Lighting service locations. Services will be held in all 50 states, Washington D. C. and Puerto Rico, as well as more than a dozen countries abroad. A remembrance book will be open to receive messages on the day of the Worldwide Candle Lighting. Anyone who is not able to attend a service is invited to light a candle in their home.
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