April 2, 2002
Demonstration Project Aids Groups in West
By GINNY MERRIAM of the Missoulian
In Rhode Island, the staffs of 18 nursing homes recently learned how to start pain management teams.
In Alabama, Alabamians for Better Care at Life's End are spreading the word about the state's new advance directive forms, which describe an individual's instructions about care at the end of life.
In Maine, the Maine Consortium for Palliative Care and Hospice recently sponsored a series of discussions with the Maine State Prison staff.
In Oklahoma, Palliative Care Week can bring 60 events to 31 towns around the state.
In Missoula, the Missoula Demonstration Project is launching new work as an official mentor to such community-based groups in 14 Western states. Lilly Tuholske, MDP's director of programs and communications, will coordinate the effort as director of its new Rallying Points Center.
"It is addressing end-of-life issues as a societal issue that affects all of us," Tuholske said.
Since journalist Bill Moyers' four-part series "On Our Own Terms" aired about a year and a half ago, about 300 coalitions of people working on end-of-life issues in their towns have sprung up. Rallying Points, a project of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation's Last Acts campaign to improve care at the end of life, works out of regional resource centers in Kansas City, Mo., and Largo, Fla., and a national center designed to reach minorities in Washington, D.C.
MDP in Missoula has become the third regional center, named by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. In practical terms, it means MDP will be able to share its groundbreaking work in improving the quality of life's end, said Mark Hanson, MDP's executive director. The "demonstration" in MDP will be available to 14 states, he said.
"MDP was the first to ask an entire community how it wanted to improve the quality of the end of life," he said. "Practically, it means that MDP will be able to share a lot of resources with the rest of the region."
Tuholske will help Rallying Points coalitions around the region with workshops, strategic planning, links to information, program development and planning. About twice a year, organizations can take part in ask-the-expert conference calls.
Groups in the region have different focuses, Tuholske said. Some work on advance care planning, some on pain management, some on family caregiving and some on promoting palliative care in hospice organizations. The Rallying Points groups, about 50 in the West, all work in collaborations or two or more organizations and all have a track record of accomplishments in their communities.
"It really is an opportunity for us to start sharing what we learn a little more proactively,' Hanson said. "It's an opportunity for us to really plug in much more actively with communities around the West."
Missoula physician Ira Byock and Missoula gerontologist Barbara Spring founded the Missoula Demonstration Project in 1996. The organization studies and researches issues of death and dying and is devoted to creating a community approach to the end of life in Missoula. The community is an example for others who want to create a similar model.
"Problems at the end of life have to do with everyone," Tuholske said. "This is not just a medical issue. Everybody should be involved."
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