Resources and Educational Material

Here you will find Valuable information to assist you in caring for Palliative and Hospice patients of all ages and offering guidance to those caring for them throughout their disease processes.

• General
• Advance Care Planning/Communication
• Decision Making Assistance
• Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST)
• Hospice
• Legal/Ethical
• Pain/Symptom Management
• Pain Assessment Scales
• Pediatrics
• Critical Care
• Education
• Research

Some of the links below are PDFs. You will need acrobat reader to open them. 

General

• CAPC - A resource for health care professionals who want to share information, exchange ideas, and get advice from their colleagues on clinical, educational and operational issues.
• Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association - Professional nursing organization, offering education, resources, research, and certification.
• National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization
• What is Palliative Care: Information and Resources for Healthcare Professionals - General information for healthcare professionals.
• Palliative Doctors: Compassionate care at any stage of an illness. Resources for patients and loved ones from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.

Advance Care Planning/Communication

• Advice for Physicians Caring for Dying Patients - Tips to help physicians discuss end-of-life issues with their patients.
• POLST: Honoring Patients' Wishes for Treatment - 47-minute video discusses the CA POLST program, its implications, and how physicians have the POLST conversation with a patient.
• Talking About Treatment Options and Palliative Care - A Guide for Clinicians.

Decision Making Assistance

• Artificial Nutrition And Hydration at the End of Life
• CPR: A Guide for Decision Making. Answers common questions about what CPR involves and important things to think about when making a decision about CPR.
• Decisions. Six bulletins on end-of-life topics, including the changing role of medicine and the changing view of death, quality of life, communicating decisions with loved ones, communication tools, partnering with your doctor, and living and dying in a caring community.
• If you or someone you love is very ill: Ask tough questions.  Important questions to ask your doctor, health care agent, lawyer, loved ones, spiritual caregiver, and social worker.
• Patient/Family Teaching Sheets.  From Hospice and Palliative Nurses Association.
• Tube Feeding: A Guide for Decision Making.  Answers common questions about feeding tubes, their benefits and risks, and who is and is not helped by feeding tubes.

Physician Orders for Life-Sustaining Treatment (POLST)

• 2011 California POLST Form. A physician order that gives seriously ill patients more control over their end-of-life care by specifying the types of medical treatment that a patient wishes to receive towards the end of life.
• POLST Frequently Asked Questions
• Facing Serious Illness: Making Your Wishes Known. Your guide to POLST

Hospice

• Hospice Services Provided in Per Day Coverage. Breakdown of covered Hospice services by Medicare, Medicaid, and private plans.
• The Medicare Hospice Benefit. Details on the Hospice benefit for Medicare beneficiaries.

Legal/Ethical

• California's Health Care Decisions Law Fact Sheet
• Determining The Appropriate Decision-Maker
• Guide for Assessing Medical Decision-Making Capacity 

Pain/Symptom Management

• Suggestions for End-of-Life Symptom Management (Adult)

Pain Assessment Scales

• Face, Legs, Activity, Cry, Consolability scale - Validated in children between 2 mos-7yrs, individuals that are unable to communicate their pain.
• Neonatal Pain, Agitation, & Sedation Scale (NPASS) - For use in pre-term and term neonates.
• Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) - For use with individuals who can point to or state the number that reflects their current pain level.
• Pain Assessment in Advanced Dementia Scale (PAINAD) - Validated in older adults with dementia or cognitive impairment who are unable to reliably communicate their pain.
• Pain Assessment Tool for Non-Cognizant Adults
• Verbal Descriptor Scale (Pain Thermometer) - For use with any patient, especially those with moderate to severe cognitive impairment.
• Wong-Baker FACES Pain Rating Scale - For children over the age of 3 who can point to the face that reflects their current pain level.

Pediatrics

• Pediatric Concurrent Care Continuum Briefing - Overview of Concurrent Care for Children provision in the Affordable Care Act (ACA).
• Standards of Practice for Pediatric Palliative Care and Hospice - 2009 guidelines from the National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization.
• The Initiative for Pediatric Palliative Care (IPPC) - Education and quality improvement effort aimed at enhancing care for children with life-threatening conditions.

Critical Care

• Acute and Critical Care Choices: Guide to Advance Health Care Directives - Information for critical care nurses about legal, ethical, and transcultural principles guiding the preparation of advance directives, advance directive documents and materials for patient education.
• The IPAL Project - Improving Palliative Care in the ICU.

Education

• CancerPEN Open Modules - Educational modules on cancer palliation, including artificial nutrition/hydration, survivorship, anxiety and depression, and bereavement.
• Care at the Close of Life: Evidence and Experience - Journal of the American Medical Association educational guide with many end-of-life topics.
• Center for Palliative Care Education - Educational resource center and training program for HIV/AIDS Palliative Care.
• Complimentary E-Learning Courses Offered for Hospice and Palliative Medicine Fellows - Center to Advance Palliative Care.
• Continuing Education Curriculum for Hospice and Palliative Care Physicians - Resources for physicians from the American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine.
• Education in Palliative and End-of-Life Care - Education for all health care professionals in the essential competencies of Palliative Care.
• Educational Modules for the Critical Care Communication (C3) Course - 7 learning modules covering fundamental communication skills, giving bad news, determining goals of care, resuscitation preferences, holding a family conference, discussing the dying process, and navigating conflict.
• End-Of-Life Issues - Ten modules from the American Psychological Association on topics including psychological distress, pain management, cognitive disorders, grief and bereavement, religious/spiritual issues, family caregiving, teamwork, legal/ethical, and advance care planning.
• End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) - National education initiative to improve palliative care by training nurses in palliative care.
• End of Life Online Curriculum - 9 modules from Stanford on dyspnea, Hospice, opioid conversion, prognostication, transition to death, palliative sedation, communication, and bereavement.
• End of Life/Palliative Education Resource Center - Fast facts on almost 300 topics, educational materials, and research.
• EthnoMed End of Life Clinical Topics - Cultural considerations in end-of-life care.
• IPPC Curriculum - Free online education about pediatric Palliative Care.
• LearnICU: Ethics & End of Life - Educational resources from the Society of Critical Care Medicine.
• National Hospice and Palliative Care Organization (NHPCO) Educational Calendar - Educational offerings of the NHPCO.
• NHPCO Webinars - Interdisciplinary topics 2nd Thursday of each month, quality/regulatory topics 4th Tuesdays of each month.
• Self Assessment: Palliative and End-of-Life Care - Test your knowledge of palliative care with this tool from the American Association of Critical-Care Nurses (AACN).
• Training and Education - List of educational offerings from the Center to Advance Palliative Care.

Research

• End-of-Life Care Research Program - University of Washington School of Medicine.
• Innovations in End-of-Life Care - An international journal of leaders in end-of-life care.
• National Palliative Care Research Center - Committed to stimulating, developing, and funding research directed at improving care for seriously ill patients and their families.
• Spotlight on End-of-Life Research - National Institute of Nursing Research.