Message from the Chair
&
Executive Director
Kathleen M. Foley, MD (USA)
Liliana De Lima, MHA (USA)
Dear Readers:
As we announced in the last issue of our Newsletter, IAHPC joined forces with the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) to promote a global research agenda in palliative care. Both organizations collaborated to draft a document calling governments, health authorities, policy makers, institutions and care providers to support and fund palliative care research, especially in developing countries. The document is called the Declaration of Venice and during the 4th Research Forum of the EAPC, several organizations were invited to review the draft and help finalize this declaration.
The organizations that were represented in this meeting and collaborated in this process were:
African Palliative Care Association (APCA)
Asia Pacific Hospice and Palliative Care Network (APHN)
Eastern and Central Europe Palliative Task Force (ECEPT)
European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC)
International Association for Hospice and Palliative Care (IAHPC)
International Observatory in End of Life Care (IOELC)
American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine (AAHPM)
National Hospice and Palliative Care Association (NHPCO) - USA
Palliative Care Australia (PCA)
Latin American Association for Palliative Care (ALCP)
Kings College - London, UK
Neighborhood Network in Palliative Care (NNPC) - India
Sociedad Española de Cuidados Paliativos (SECPAL) - Spain
Help the Hospices (HtH) - UK
We are very grateful to all, and particularly with Professor David Clark for his wonderful help in the editing process.
We need your help in endorsing the Declaration by signing it and calling on governments, policy makers, administrators and carers to support palliative care research, especially in developing countries. Click here to read the Declaration and sign it https://www.hospicecare.com/dv/
Come visit us at the IAHPC booth #102 in the UICC World Cancer Congress in Washington July 8-12!
Next week IAHPC will be in the UICC World Cancer Congress in Washington, DC. The organization is sponsoring a session on palliative care titled Integrating Palliative Care into National Health Policy and Programs: Models and Best Practices on Tuesday, July 11 th, from 15:30 to 17:00. The session will be chaired by Kathy Foley and the speakers include:
- David Joranson: Changing Drug Policy to Improve Opioid availability for Pain and Palliative Care Programs: The Romanian experience
- Stein Kassa: National Standards for Palliative Care in Cancer: A Country Approach
- Robin Faisinger: Integrating Palliative Care in Cancer Care: The Edmonton Palliative Care Program
- Emilio Herrera Molina: Palliative Care as a Component of Public Policy: The Regional Program at Extremadura, Spain
We invite you to attend our session and take the opportunity to hear these palliative care leaders present models and strategies which have been effective in incorporating palliative care and pain relief into public health policies. For more information about the congress and a copy of the program,
click on http://www.2006conferences.org/pdfs/UICCDailyProgram.pdf
We look forward to seeing you there!
During the 4 th Research EAPC Forum in Venice, the Task Force (TF) on the Development of Palliative Care in Europe presented the results of the last three years of work. The TF is under the leadership of Dr. Carlos Centeno Cortes, from the Universidad de Navarra in Spain. A summary of the results as well as a link to the regional European map showing the number of services is included in this issue. Congratulations to Carlos and all the members of the TF for the hard work and great results.
Our support to individuals and institutions through IAHPC Programs continues.
This issue includes interesting reports from some of our recent grantees:
- Dr. Parag Bharadwaj from San Diego, USA, who traveled as an IAHPC Fellow to teach palliative care at the College of Medicine, in Plovdiv Bulgaria, and
- Doctors Ibrahim Elfadil from Khartoum, Sudan and Jorge Eisenchlas from Buenos Aires, Argentina, who traveled to the EAPC Research Forum in Venice.
We are pleased to announce that IAHPC has approved a Faculty Development grant to the Universidad Catolica in Santiago , Chile to implement a full time teaching position in palliative care at the medical school. Dr. Alejandra Palma has been designated as the teaching professor and will be under the supervision of Dr. Flavio Nervi. The Universidad has established a working partnership with Clinica Familia, a 40-bed free standing hospice which offers multidisciplinary care to patients with HIV, cancer and other conditions. Congratulations to the staff members, volunteers and administrators at the Universidad Catolica for their commitment to implement faculty positions in palliative care. We are sure this program will serve as a role model for not only Chile, but also other Latin American countries.
Through our Faculty Development Program, the IAHPC pays for the salary of a professor in palliative care in an academic hospital or university. In addition to this one in the Universidad Catolica, IAHPC is currently sponsoring and funding teaching positions in palliative care in the Ocean Road Cancer Institute in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania and Sichuan University in Chengdu, China. We hope these programs will serve as teaching centers in their regions and that they will be able to develop teaching models appropriate to their cultural, socioeconomic characteristics and the needs of the patient populations they treat.
In response to a request from the Cancer Control Program at the World Health Organization (WHO) IAHPC recently developed, with the collaboration of others, a List of Essential Medicines in Palliative Care. IAHPC has sent the finalized list to WHO and will be distributing it to the editors of several pain and palliative care journals for them to publish. A copy of the Press Release is on our website at: http://www.hospicecare.com/announce.htm
During these past months, we have received many donations from many individuals across the world. Without your help and donations we would have be unable to continue our work. We invite those who have not donated or joined IAHPC, to consider doing so and helping us in this effort.
We are also very grateful with Grunenthal GmbH in Germany, Purdue Pharma in the USA and Mundipharma in the UK for their unconditional donations to fund our programs and operations.
Until next month,
Kathy Foley, MD
Chair, Board of Directors
Liliana De Lima, MHA
Executive Director
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