Palliative Care Blog

Primary Care Physician Finds Passion, Purpose in Palliative Care

Dr. Larry Boggeln Discovered Early That Caring for People With Serious Illness Was His True Calling

As a family practice physician working in Temecula in the 1980s, Dr. Laurence (Larry) Boggeln began making house calls to patients who were too sick to come to his office. Those visits, and the connection he felt with people suffering from serious illness, put Boggeln on a life-changing path to a career in hospice and palliative medicine.

More than 30 years later, he is the medical director of the Temecula branch of Elizabeth Hospice and an Assistant Clinical Professor of Family Medicine at Temecula Valley Hospital, where he is working to incorporate primary palliative care into the curriculum for the hospital’s Family Medicine and Internal Medicine residents.

The project reflects Boggeln’s own journey as a physician and his commitment to helping the next generation of family physicians better care for patients with serious or life-limiting illness.

[Read more…]

CSUMB Team Receives $60K Grant for Palliative Care Study

A palliative care research proposal led by a professor at California State University, Monterey Bay (CSUMB) has received a grant of $60,000 from Hospice Giving Foundation, an independent grant-making foundation focused on end-of-life care and preparedness.

CSUMB is a Campus Partner of the CSU Shiley Institute for Palliative Care.

Since 1997, Hospice Giving Foundation has proudly awarded over $25 million in grants to regional programs dedicated to strengthening and improving hospice and palliative care, and other end-of-life care services, for children and adults.

The grant will fully fund a feasibility study to plan how best to offer palliative care education in Monterey County to strengthen the capability of healthcare providers delivering high quality, linguistically and culturally appropriate care to people with serious illness and their families.

Working to Expand Access to Palliative Care

“I’m very grateful that our team received these funds for us to complete a full investigation into what educational model would best serve our community,” said Alyssa Erikson, RN, PhD, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Nursing at CSUMB, and the Faculty Director of the CSU Shiley Institute for Palliative Care at CSUMB.

[Read more…]

Dr. Christine Ritchie Says More Research, Innovative Leadership Needed to Move Palliative Care Forward

Renowned Geriatrician and Palliative Physician will Deliver Keynote Address at 2019 National Symposium for Academic Palliative Care Education and Research

Dr. Christine Ritchie’s journey as a palliative care leader and visionary started in an unlikely place – down a rural dirt road in southeastern Kentucky where, though she had yet to enter medical school, Ritchie was asked to care for and preside over the death of a woman dying of cancer.

At the time, the untrained Ritchie had been shadowing a nurse practitioner on home visits to mostly underserved populations in the mountains. The NP left her at the dying woman’s home with instructions to “be with these folks while I go take care of more urgent things.” For Ritchie, the experience was transformative.

“The honor of being with this woman and her family during that sacred journey had a profound impact on me,” said Ritchie, now a board-certified geriatrician and palliative physician. “From that point on I was drawn to the care of those who were seriously ill.”

[Read more…]

How Navigating Vulnerability and Leading Well From Within Helped Dr. Daniel Friedland Heal Himself, Others

Conscious Leadership Pioneer will Deliver Opening Keynote at the 2019 National Symposium for Palliative Care Education and Research

Internationally recognized leadership and resiliency expert Daniel Friedland, MD, can trace his journey as a leader back to his days as a medical student at the University of California San Francisco, where his passion and purpose was shaped by a painful experience of stress, self-doubt, and burnout.

At a dark point in his studies, overwhelmed by stress and fear, the young Friedland sought counseling, embarrassed that in an academic environment filled with the best and brightest, it seemed he alone was struggling. He quickly learned the truth.

[Read more…]