Caring for Veterans with Serious Illness.

US Veterans comprise approximately 7% of the population. About half of these Veterans seek care within the Department of Veterans Affairs; the other half receive their health-care services in the wider community. Community providers should be familiar with the unique needs of Veterans and the resources that exist to provide care for them. This article discusses the unique culture of Veterans, conditions that are more common among Veterans and the challenges these conditions may pose, and the resources available to Veterans through the Veterans Health Administration.

Top Ten Tips Palliative Care Clinicians Should Know About Cognitive Impairment and Institutional Care.

Most long-term care (LTC) residents are of age >65 years and have multiple chronic health conditions affecting their cognitive and physical functioning. Although some individuals in nursing homes return home after receiving therapy services, most will remain in a LTC facility until their deaths. This article seeks to provide guidance on how to assess and effectively select treatment for delirium, behavioral and psychological symptoms for patients with dementia, and address other common challenges such as advanced care planning, decision-making capacity, and artificial hydration at the end of life. To do so, we draw upon a team of physicians with training in various backgrounds such as geriatrics, palliative medicine, neurology, and psychiatry to shed light on those important topics in the following "Top 10" tips.

Advance Care Planning in Cognitively Impaired Older Adults.

Older adults with cognitive impairment face many healthcare challenges, chief among them participating in medical decision-making about their own health care. Advance care planning (ACP) is the process whereby individuals communicate their wishes for future care with their clinicians and surrogate decision-makers while they are still able to do so. ACP has been shown to improve important outcomes for individuals with cognitive impairment, but rates of ACP for these individuals are low because of individual-, clinician-, and system-related factors. Addressing ACP early in the illness trajectory can maximize the chances that people can participate meaningfully. This article recommends best practices for approaching ACP for older adults with cognitive impairment. The importance of providing anticipatory guidance and eliciting values to guide future care to create a shared framework between clinicians, individuals, and surrogate decision-makers is emphasized. It is recommended that ACP be approached as an iterative process to continue to honor and support people's wishes as cognitive impairment progresses and increasingly threatens independence and function. The article describes effective strategies for assessing decision-making capacity, identifying surrogate decision-makers, and using structured communication tools for ACP. It also provides guidelines for documentation and billing. Finally, special considerations for individuals with advanced dementia are described, including the use of artificial hydration and nutrition, decisions about site of care, and the role of hospice care.

The effectiveness of the Geritalk communication skills course: a real-time assessment of skill acquisition and deliberate practice.

BACKGROUND: Communication skills are critical in Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine because these patients confront complex clinical scenarios. We evaluated the effectiveness of the Geritalk communication skills course by comparing pre- and post-course real-time assessment of the participants leading family meetings. We also evaluated the participants' sustained skills practice. MEASURES: We compare the participants' skill acquisition before and after Geritalk using a direct observation Family Meeting Communication Assessment Tool and assess their deliberate practice at follow-up. INTERVENTION: First-year Geriatrics or Palliative Medicine fellows at Mount Sinai Medical Center and the James J. Peters Bronx VA Medical Center participated in Geritalk. OUTCOMES: Pre- and post-course family meeting assessments were compared. An average net gain of 6.8 skills represented a greater than 20% improvement in use of applicable skills. At two month follow-up, most participants reported deliberate practice of fundamental and advanced skills. CONCLUSIONS/LESSONS LEARNED: This intensive training and family meeting assessment offers evidence-based communication skills training.

Caring for oneself to care for others: physicians and their self-care.

It is well known that clinicians experience distress and grief in response to their patients' suffering. Oncologists and palliative care specialists are no exception since they commonly experience patient loss and are often affected by unprocessed grief. These emotions can compromise clinicians' personal well-being, since unexamined emotions may lead to burnout, moral distress, compassion fatigue, and poor clinical decisions which adversely affect patient care. One approach to mitigate this harm is self-care, defined as a cadre of activities performed independently by an individual to promote and maintain personal well-being throughout life. This article emphasizes the importance of having a self-care and self-awareness plan when caring for patients with life-limiting cancer and discusses validated methods to increase self-care, enhance self-awareness and improve patient care.

Geritalk: communication skills training for geriatric and palliative medicine fellows.

Expert communication is essential to high-quality care for older patients with serious illness. Although the importance of communication skills is widely recognized, formal curricula for teaching communication skills to geriatric and palliative medicine fellows is often inadequate or unavailable. The current study drew upon the educational principles and format of an evidence-based, interactive teaching method to develop an intensive communication skills training course designed specifically to address the common communication challenges that geriatric and palliative medicine fellows face. The 2-day retreat, held away from the hospital environment, included large-group overview presentations, small-group communication skills practice, and development of future skills practice commitment. Faculty received in-depth training in small-group facilitation techniques before the course. Geriatric and palliative medicine fellows were recruited to participate in the course and 100% (n = 18) enrolled. Overall satisfaction with the course was very high (mean 4.8 on a 5-point scale). After the course, fellows reported an increase in self-assessed preparedness for specific communication challenges (mean increase 1.4 on 5-point scale, P < .001). Two months after the course, fellows reported a high level of sustained skills practice (mean 4.3 on 5-point scale). In sum, the intensive communication skills program, customized for the specific needs of geriatric and palliative medicine fellows, improved fellows' self-assessed preparedness for challenging communication tasks and provided a model for ongoing deliberate practice of communication skills.

Do not resuscitate does not mean do not treat: how palliative care and other modalities can help facilitate communication about goals of care in advanced illness.

A do-not-resuscitate (DNR) order is commonly used for hospitalized patients with advanced illness. It reflects only the desires of a patient once he or she suffers a full cardiopulmonary arrest. It does not reflect preferences about other forms of life-sustaining treatments. This article reviews the definition of a DNR order, describes the evidence suggesting that physicians use a DNR order in making determinations about other life-sustaining treatments, and will provide tools such as the use of palliative care consultations and combined directives in discussing overall goals of care.