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Home Community Education

Develop the skills to communicate with your seriously ill patients

Learn how to have tough conversations with patients

Developing the skills necessary to have quality conversations with your seriously ill patients doesn’t always come naturally.  We provide evidence-based workshops to empower the care team to have these difficult conversations by providing them with easy-to-implement, proven communications strategies.  

  1. Introduction to Communication in Serious Illness (1 hour workshop )

  2. Communications in Serious Illness workshop (2.5 hours)

  3. Communications in Serious Illness Train-the-Trainer workshop (5.5-hours)

  4. Introduction to POLST (1 Hour)

  5. Communications in Serious Illness and POLST (3 hours)

  6. Communications in Serious Illness and POLST Train-the-Trainer (5.5 hours)

Visit our calendar to view upcoming workshops and other TLC related events


 

Introduction to Communication in Serious Illness

A 1-hour learning workshop for professionals in a healthcare setting. This session is available in a live webinar.

This workshop provides healthcare providers tools to have difficult conversations about goals of care by using easy-to-implement, evidence-based communication tools and strategies. Learn how to build rapport, give difficult news, respond to emotion, assess patient understanding, discuss prognosis, identify support systems, and elicit treatment goals to develop a plan for future care. The objectives for this session are to review the need for a systematic approach to having more, better and earlier conversations about patient values and priorities in serious illness, defining a population with serious illness for whom improved communication holds many benefits, reviewing a structured communication tool to facilitate communication in patients with serious illness, and discussing the value of summarizing, follow up and documentation. The target audience for the Communication in Serious Illness workshop is healthcare teams such as physicians, nurses, social workers, other healthcare providers and clergy.


 

Communication in Serious Illness

A 2.5-hour learning workshop for professionals in a healthcare setting

This workshop provides healthcare providers tools to have difficult conversations about goals of care by using easy-to-implement, proven communication tools and strategies.  Learn how to build rapport, give difficult news, respond to emotion, assess patient understanding, discuss prognosis, identify support systems, and elicit treatment goals to develop a plan for future care. The objectives for this 2.5-hour didactic session are to review the need for a systematic approach to having more, better and earlier conversations about patient values and priorities in serious illness, defining a population with serious illness for whom improved communication holds many benefits, applying a structured communication tool to facilitate communication in patients with serious illness, and reviewing the value of summarizing, follow up and documentation. During this highly interactive workshop, participants will have the opportunity to practice case study conversations. The target audience for the Communication in Serious Illness workshop is healthcare teams such as physicians, nurses, social workers, other healthcare providers and clergy.

 

I feel so much more confident in starting these conversations. The empathic responses and conversation guide are excellent! 
—Nurse Practitioner Home Health/Hospice, Sierra Vista


 

Communication in Serious Illness - Train the Trainer

A 5.5-hour Train-the-Trainer workshop for professionals in a healthcare setting

This 5.5-hour Train-the-Trainer workshop equips the healthcare professional with knowledge, skills and resources to teach the 2.5-hour Communication in Serious Illness workshop.  In this workshop, participants will learn to define a population of patients with serious illness for whom improved communication holds many benefits, apply a structured communication tool to elicit goals of care in patients with serious illness, review the value of summarizing, follow up and documentation of the conversation and goals of care, and apply principles of adult learning and facilitation to encourage engagement.  This workshop includes skills practice and role play with feedback and debriefing. Target audience is healthcare teams such as physicians, nurses, social workers and other healthcare providers.  

 

The use of silence during difficult patient conversations.
—Resident, Yuma Regional Medical Center

 


 

Introduction to POLST

A 1-hour class for professionals in a healthcare setting. This session is available in a live webinar.

This one-hour workshop equips healthcare professionals with knowledge and resources to begin using POLST in Arizona.   The objectives are to describe what POLST is at the state and national level, explain why POLST is important, define the population for POLST, when to begin the conversation and who completes POLST, describe the process for completing, reviewing and updating POLST,  and learn the process of submitting healthcare planning documents to the Arizona Healthcare Directive Registry. Target audience is healthcare professionals who plan on using POLST or caring for patients/residents who have a POLST in all care settings.

There is a fee of $25/person for this workshop.

 

The serious illness conversation guide is the most important thing I will actively use. It is going in my white coat pocket. 
—Physician, HonorHealth Osborn


 

Communication in Serious Illness and POLST (3-hour workshop)

A 3-hour workshop for professionals in a healthcare setting

This three-hour workshop equips healthcare professionals with knowledge, skills and resources to have the goals of care conversation with someone who is seriously ill and begin using POLST in Arizona.  Objectives are to apply a structured communication tool to facilitate the communication in patients with serious illness and elicit goals of care, describe what POLST is at the state and national level and why it is important, define the population for Communication in Serious Illness and POLST, when to begin the conversation and who completes POLST in Arizona, describe the process for completing, reviewing and updating POLST, and describe how POLST could be implemented in your care setting. Target audience is healthcare professionals who plan on using POLST or caring for patients/residents who have a POLST in all care settings.

There is a $50 fee/person for this workshop.


 

Communication in Serious Illness and POLST Train-the-Trainer

A 5.5-hour workshop for professionals in a healthcare setting

The purpose of this 5.5-hour interactive workshop is to prepare participants to lead Communication in Serious Illness and POLST workshop.  This class will introduce clinicians to how to use a systematic approach for better and earlier conversations about patient values and priorities in serious illness.  Learn POLST fundamentals and how it aligns with advance care planning, what is required for the form to be accepted in the State of Arizona and what population may benefit from a POLST. During this workshop participants will have the opportunity to discuss the POLST form elements and how it aligns with the goals of care conversation, how to complete the form and when to review and update it.  The target audience for this workshop is physicians, nurses, social workers and other healthcare providers who want to learn how to teach others how to communicate with patients and families facing serious illness and utilize POLST in Arizona.

Train the trainer expectations will be to successfully co-facilitate training with an approved trainer, submit all required paperwork and commit to co-host future training sessions using set curricula.

There is a fee of $100/person for this workshop.