Spreading the word

Today I am presenting Grand Attending Rounds, along with Dr. Emily Riegel, for our pediatric department.  Faculty, residents, students, nurses, social workers and a host of others will likely be in attendance.  I love this opportunity - the opportunity to share with others what pediatric palliative care is and, perhaps more importantly, what it is becoming.

When I started 'doing' pediatric palliative care, it was end-of-life care.  We 'circled the wagons' when we learned that a child was not likely to survive.  And, we began a flurry of activity.  Some of it was very good, and seemed to help families a lot.  And, some of it was.... good intentions without much bang for ones' buck.  We were all learning - families and professionals doing the best we could with the knowledge that we had at that time.

Today, we have much more knowledge.  I have been very fortunate to have the opportunity to truly study pediatric palliative care, in addition to experiencing the same 'baptism by fire' that many of my readers likely experienced, too!  It is exciting to see the learning opportunities that now exist.  In my PhD program, I took a psychology course that focused on pediatric palliative care; a social work course that was entitled "Loss and Grief"; a nursing course that was on end-of-life issues; and several seminar (6 semsters!) courses that enlightened me about 'disability' and enabled me to develop my strategies and approach to enabling persons to engage to the maximum extent possible for them, at that moment.

Later, I took the End of Life Nursing Education Consortium (ELNEC) course, the Initiative for Pediatric Palliative Care (IPPC) training, and four courses from Mount Idea Center on Death Education focusing on children's grief and bereavement, parents' recovery after the loss of a child, and several other palliative care topics.

Even though I have had significant opportunities to learn about pediatric palliative care through formal courses, there is nothing that replaces what I have learned from children, parents and a few, precious colleagues (thank you, Dr. Barnard!).  They are the persons who have taught me what is really important and how to do pediatric palliative care. 

I have learned more as I prepared today's talk and am reminded of the sense of wonder I often feel when speaking about palliative care.  Today, I will share some of what I have been fortunate to learn with my colleagues.  My hope is that they will feel a bit of the glimmer of hope, wonder and excitement that I feel each time I have the opportunity to cross through another portal of learning.  I hope I can be a bit of the light that illuminates their path.