Traveling Scholars Program Report
Nicholas Lee Wei Law
Travel date: October 4, 2023
Name of Meeting/Event/Activity: Asia Pacific Hospice Palliative Care Network
Origin: Kuching, Malaysia / Destination: Incheon, Republic of Korea
How was this meeting/activity helpful to you?
Pre-conference workshop and plenary speech on demoralisation by Prof David Kissane - The workshop and plenary session details
about how demoralisation is a disorder of meaning compared to depression where it is a disorder of mood. This bridges the gap as to
why patients who may not be depressed may still feel pointless and end their lives prematurely. This is of importance to patients on
palliative care as many of them may feel that life is not worth living when symptoms are not well controlled or when total pain is not
addressed.
How will you new knowledge & acquired skills help in furthering your work in hospice and palliative care in your program/city/ or country?
I managed to discuss with Dr Natasha who was with Prof David Kissane and we are interested in getting the demoralisation scale
translated to Bahasa Malaysia. This will aim to make a screening tool more applicable to our own population and to look at the
prevalence in our population.
What were the three main takeaways from this conference/event
1. Palliative care infrastructure requires a multidisciplinary effort that will require a multi-pronged approach in order to achieve universal
integration within healthcare systems. This will require further advocacy, legalisation, increased access to medications and education
to systemically change the climate towards palliative care.
2. Demoralisation is thought to be the main reason of why patients choose to end their lives and more needs to be done to find out the
prevalence in our community and subsequently to be able to find out what enables them to find hope and meaning.
3. Different cultures grieve differently and we will need to tailor a culturally appropriate response in order to help our own patients
Did you attend a session or workshop on improving availability and access to medicines for palliative care? If yes, describe how you plan to improve the availability and safe and rational use of medicines in palliative care in your institution, city, or country
Yes, we aim to increase health clinic palliative care coverage throughout the whole state in phases with each master clinic training
smaller health clinics in rural and regional areas within the state. Part of the training will include improved access to medications and
outpatient visits to patients homes for palliative care support.
Did you attend a session or workshop on education in palliative care? If applicable, describe how you plan to enact changes to curricula in your academic institution
Yes, we would aim for all future physician trainees within the state to rotate through palliative care. This would give more exposure and
will train future doctors to be better equipped to deal with palliative care
Did you submit an abstract for a poster and/or an oral presentation and if so was/were they accepted? What was/were the title(s)?
Yes, To Refer or Not To Refer? ATTITUDES AND BELIEFS OF ONCOLOGY REGARDING PALLIATIVE CARE REFERRALS
My abstract was accepted as an oral presentation and I had the privilege of presenting my findings to an international audience. I had
several questions asked about the changes this research has brought about which looked at attitudes and beliefs of oncology
practitioners. It was a positive experience and gave me more confidence to be able to speak to an international audience. This
experience also made me more mindful about how to engage with an audience from multicultural / different backgrounds.