Wald Lectureship: Unique partnership advances end-of-life care
March 4, 2016
As more baby boomers age, the need for quality end-of-life care – and people to provide it – continues to increase. This growing need also comes with the demand for quality training. To that end, nearly 900 people, including nurses, physicians, chaplains and bereavement counselors, will gather in Bloomington, Minnesota, this April to learn how to best provide end-of-life care during the Minnesota Network of Hospice and Palliative Care Conference.
The conference will kick off April 10 with a lecture by Pamela Malloy, the national director of the End-of-Life Nursing Education Consortium, who will speak about the ways providers of hospice and palliative care must care for themselves to avoid burnout and compassion fatigue. The half-day presentation is sponsored by the University of Minnesota School of Nursing Katharine J. Densford International Center for Nursing Leadership.
Susan Marschalk, executive director of Minnesota Network of Hospice and Palliative Care, says the partnership with the School of Nursing is one that her peers across the country envy. “We are incredibly fortunate to be able to partner with the University of Minnesota School of Nursing,” said Marschalk. “Not only do conference attendees get to hear a national scholar speak about important end-of-life care issues, the partnership with the School of Nursing brings credibility to the conference and adds value.”
The Florence Schorske Wald Lectureship on Hospice and Palliative Care Lectureship was established at the University of Minnesota School of Nursing in 1997 to honor Florence Schorske Wald, who is credited with bringing the hospice movement to the United States from England. The lectureship was established to promote collaboration between academia and practice in the Twin Cities.
“The Wald lecture provides the opportunity to bring the science of nursing and the work of universities together with the art of caring for an engaging discussion on best practices when grappling with end-of-life issues,” said Dan Pesut, director of the Densford Center.
The conference, which runs April 10-12, is among the largest such conferences on the topic of end-of-life care in the country and includes 55 sessions covering topics ranging from cultural sensitivity, pain management and patient/client communication to ethics and policy issues.
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