Conversations during Serious Illness
Overview
Communication matters to all healthcare discussions and is especially important when a patient is diagnosed with a serious illness. Successful communication requires that all members of the healthcare team be prepared to elicit and understand the perspective of the patient and his or her family to create a customized treatment plan, and to adjust that plan as the patient’s needs change through the course of illness. Moreover, healthcare professionals who are equipped to support patients and their loved ones through the emotionally challenging circumstances of serious illness provide the highest quality of care and experience deep career satisfaction.
Since communication skills become habitual and habits are difficult to change, simply telling clinicians what they “ought” to do is ineffective. Communication, like any other skill, is a set of behaviors that can be identified, analyzed, taught and learned. IHC’s highly effective training model presents key skills in a conceptual model that facilitates recall, demonstrates the skills in a contextually relevant way, and then affords opportunities for learners to practice the skills with immediate observation and feedback from expert facilitators and peers. Theories and practice in adult learning support the value of periodic review to help deepen and apply the skills, so they become part of each learner’s practice habits.
The Conversations during Serious Illness (CSI) program is a series of five brief modules that may be employed singly as stand-alone sessions for skills introduction or review, as a full series, or in any combination of parts. As with all IHC programs, the modules are highly interactive. Each module provides opportunities for learners to reflect and to rehearse specific skills and techniques for application in conversations with patients. Each module offers a flexible array of exercises to meet learners’ specific needs. Modules vary in duration from a minimum 1 hour to a maximum of 3.5 hours.
The five modules include:
Module I: Sharing Serious News
Module II: Benefits of Palliative Care
Module III: Discussing Advance Care Plans (ACP)
Module IV: Preparing for Death
Module V: Who Moved My Oxygen Mask? Self-Care and Resilience
- Duration 1 Day
- Accreditation Approved for CE
- Available To Clinicians
Audience
Conversations during Serious Illness (CSI) modules are designed for practicing clinicians or clinicians in training in a wide range of professions and specialty areas. CSI modules are particularly applicable for healthcare professionals who care for seriously ill patients, yet do not seek specialization in palliative care. Workshops can accommodate 6-30 learners to ensure individualized attention and optimal small group learning.
Content
The Conversations during Serious Illness (CSI) workshop modules bring to bear extensive evidence for the application of foundational communication skills and best practices for supporting patients and families around the multifaceted challenges of serious illness. Individually and in aggregate, these modules engage clinicians to understand key challenges and practice essential communication skills to meet those challenges.
Module I: Sharing Serious News
Sharing serious news can be the most challenging part of any clinician’s work. Enhance your confidence conducting these difficult conversations by practicing evidence-based communication skills.
Module II: Benefits of Palliative Care
Palliative care is widely misunderstood and conflated with hospice care—even by many healthcare professionals. Learn how palliative care can complement and enhance the quality of care at any stage of illness, including at the time of diagnosis, and how to dispel the myths around palliative care.
Module III: Discussing Advance Care Plans (ACP)
Patients, their families and caregivers all benefit when advance care planning occurs before a crisis occurs. Understanding the barriers to advance care planning and strengthening specific communication skills facilitates this important consideration for any patient with serious illness.
Module IV: Preparing for Death
The art of helping patients and families to cope with an impending death calls for compassion, sensitivity and strong communication skills. Practice skills to elicit and address important questions.
Module V: Who Moved My Oxygen Mask? Self-Care and Resilience
Clinical work with seriously ill patients is uniquely rewarding and unquestionably challenging, and present high risks for compassion fatigue and burnout. Learn about the prevalence and signs of burnout and strategies for nurturing your own resilience.
Expectations
Learners are expected to participate in all activities in the workshop. To minimize distraction, IHC recommends that learners be freed from additional work-related tasks for the duration of the training.
Learning Objectives
The overall objectives of the CSI series of communication skills development modules are to enhance specific communication skills and learners’ confidence applying those skills in their daily practice. The conduct of each module is governed by specific learning objectives:
Module I: Sharing Serious News
1. Identify the six-step SPIKES model for sharing serious news
2. Describe three elements for preparing the setting for sharing serious news
3. Identify and respond to at least two empathic opportunities
4. Demonstrate two communication techniques for sharing serious news with patients
5. Commit to use two learned skills in your patient interactions
Module II: Benefits of Palliative Care
1. Explain how palliative care is distinct from traditional medical care and from hospice care
2. Describe the philosophy of palliative care
3. Identify three core components of palliative care
4. Simulate a palliative care conversation with a patient using the “Ask-Tell-Ask” technique
Module III: Discussing Advance Care Plans (ACP)
1. Identify two barriers to engaging in ACP conversations with patients/families
2. Recognize patient signaling openness to ACP conversation
3. Practice statements and/or questions for opening up the ACP conversation with a patient
4. Apply at least one communication technique such as empathy to respond to patient/family emotions
Module IV: Preparing for Death
1. Identify two skills to communicate effectively and compassionately about end of life (EOL) with patients and families
2. Recognize one’s own personal attitudes, feelings and values about death and dying
3. Demonstrate two techniques for showing respect for the patient’s views and wishes during EOL care
4. Describe two strategies to assist the patient and family in coping with suffering, grief and loss in EOL care
Module V: Who Moved My Oxygen Mask? Self-Care and Resilience
1. Describe two factors contributing to Empathy Fatigue (EF) and burnout in healthcare
2. Describe two symptoms of EF and burnout in the EOL healthcare professional
3. Identify three self-care strategies to maintain resilience
4. Commit to using at least two resilience strategies in healthcare practice
Methodology
Each module provides a brief, comprehensive overview of the relevant literature, interactive exercises that entail graduated levels of risk, and opportunities to receive and give balanced feedback. The overwhelming majority of each module is devoted to experiential learning opportunities, where learners work individually and in small groups to analyze video enactments of actual cases.
Workshop attendance is limited to 6-30 learners to ensure individualized attention and optimal small group learning experiences.
Faculty
The faculty for Conversations during Serious Illness are drawn from the faculty of the Institute for Healthcare Communication (IHC). Faculty members are clinicians with extensive facilitation, teaching and clinical experience. All Conversations during Serious Illness faculty members have completed an extensive faculty development program sponsored by IHC.
CME
IHC takes responsibility for the content, quality and scientific integrity of the CE/CME activities described above.
The Institute for Healthcare Communication (IHC) is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education (ACCME) to provide continuing medical education for physicians. The Institute for Healthcare Communication (IHC) designates each live activity for a maximum of 3.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the activity.
Continuing education (CE) credit may be available to non-physician participants. IHC will provide a certificate of completion, which can be submitted to learners’ respective accrediting organizations. IHC is pleased to provide any necessary documentation to help learners gain CE credits for completion of this activity.