Palliative Care Chaplaincy Introduction Training and Education Course

Essentials of Palliative Care Chaplaincy

Chaplains are professional spiritual care providers whose role becomes even more vital as patients and their loved ones find their way through serious, life-threatening illness. Every day chaplains support patients, loved ones and colleagues with spiritual and existential questions, meaning-making, ethical decisions and difficult medical treatment options. Physicians, nurses, and other members of the health care team look to chaplains for answers to vexing choices and help in building their own resilience and addressing moral distress and burnout.

The classes for both July 26^th and September 13th are now full. The next course begins September 20^th. Registration for that cohort is now open. Click the Register Now to the right button to save your seat!

Chaplains help to weave a tapestry of meaning out of the frayed strands of loss, illness and change while holding hearts steady in an environment beset with complex treatment choices, limited time, and increasing regulatory and financial pressures. Doing so requires skill, artistry, support from peers and colleagues, preparation and training.

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New Course for Chaplains

The California State University Institute for Palliative Care, known for its strong history of providing education in palliative care, is pleased to announce Essentials of Palliative Care Chaplaincy. This new course was developed in conjunction with the Association for Professional Chaplains (APC), which serves chaplains in all types of health and human service settings.

With more than 5,500 member chaplains and affiliates, APC members are involved in chaplaincy care of all persons, respecting their diverse cultures, identities, abilities and beliefs. As a national, not-for-profit 501(c)(3) professional association, APC advocates for quality chaplaincy care of all persons in health care facilities, correctional institutions, long-term care units, rehabilitation centers, hospice, the military and other specialized settings.

“It is important for everyone to know what the history is of palliative care, to know signs that they need to be looking for with patients, they need to have that background in order to really be able to differentiate between a need to provide general spiritual care for patients and be able to recognize how there might be a deeper need and a deeper sense of what is best for this patient.”

Kimberly Murman, APC President

• Video Transcript

  APC is so excited to partner with CSU on this palliative care course because it’s such an integral part of what we need to provide for our chaplains for their own personal professional development and also for the development in the success for the facilities that they work for.

  And so we’ve worked with CSU for a while to make sure that this is the right course, the best course, and something that we’re proud to offer with them.

  So we’re very grateful for the opportunity and honored to be a part of it.

  I think the course is important, not just for people who want to do palliative care as a specialty, but it’s important for everyone to know what the history is of palliative care; to know signs that they need to be looking for with patients.

  They need to have that background in order to really be able to differentiate between a need to provide general spiritual care for patients and be able to recognize how there might be a deeper need and a deeper sense of what’s best for this patient.

APC’s affiliate organization Board of Chaplaincy Certification Inc. (BCCI) offers Board Certification credentials for professional chaplains who desire to practice at the pinnacle of their field. Together APC and BCCI provide rich learning opportunities for chaplains and other health care professionals who wish to enhance their knowledge and skills at the art and practice of spiritual care for those with serious or chronic illness, and their loved ones, in hospitals, hospices, long-term care facilities, and elsewhere.

Foundational Palliative Care Knowledge

The online eight-week, 64 CE hour instructor-led Essentials of Palliative Care Chaplaincy curriculum enhances the ability of chaplains to support patients and loved ones facing the challenges of serious and chronic illness through building a strong foundation of knowledge and practice in palliative care chaplaincy. With online convenience, chaplains in any practice setting can add vital palliative skills to their practice that will enable them to function as members of the interdisciplinary team when engaged in tandem with the basic preparation for chaplaincy certification.

The course has been created by a team of national palliative care experts and seasoned clinicians from the field of palliative care chaplaincy in collaboration with the Association of Professional Chaplains and the CSU Institute for Palliative Care. Essentials of Palliative Care Chaplaincy is an instructor-led course engaged with spiritual care colleagues from chaplaincy settings across the U.S.

Learn with Colleagues

Online-learning cohorts enable participants to gain knowledge and guidance from both the practicing expert who leads the course and peer colleagues who share their wisdom and insight through participating in class assignments, reflections, and real-world case study discussions. The course is designed to facilitate a community of learners to share ideas and insights on theoretical questions as well as opportunities to network and share practical knowledge relevant to the field.

The field of palliative care is expanding across the country as health systems and organizations recognize the ways that evidence-based palliative care improves patient outcomes and the organization’s bottom line. As palliative care has expanded, so has the role of the palliative care chaplain in providing quality spiritual care patients, their loved ones, and interdisciplinary colleagues.

During the eight-week program, participants will learn to:

• Communicate palliative and end-of-life care options to help people make informed care decisions for themselves or loved ones
• Articulate the basic tenets of palliative care and the role of the palliative care chaplain as a leader on the interdisciplinary team
• Engage a full circle model of spiritual care including effective approaches to rapport building, assessment, intervention, care planning, and spiritual care outcomes
• Create and sustain programs that meet both human and institutional needs
• Analyze and construct innovative solutions for the timely delivery and reception of the multiple dimensions of palliative care, especially spiritual care, and lead in the field of palliative care chaplaincy
• Understand the importance of palliative care chaplaincy research, ethics and institutional leadership

“The CSU program is meeting what I would call a hunger among our colleagues…”

Trace Haythorn, PhD, Executive Director/CEO ACPE

• Video Transcript

  I’m aware that the CSU program is really meeting, what I would call, a kind of hunger amongst our colleagues.

  That we have people across the country that, whether they are in desperate places, or whether they simply have not been able to find time, are longing for the kind of content that the CSU program is offering.

  I think the leadership of the CSU program has been doing this for a while.

  They bring a research base, which makes it trustworthy.

  And, it’s a substantial research base, as opposed to some other programs that may be available out there that are claiming research basedbut are not quite there yet.

  And, I think the other piece is that it has been such a remarkably collaborative process from the very beginning, that to be able to meet the needs of the larger ecology of spiritual care — it’s really, ideally suited to do that well.

  I love that.

Fast Facts

Begins:	September 20, 2017
Lasts:	8 weeks
Is taught:	Completely online, available 24/7
Offers:	64 continuing education hours
Costs:	$549
Requires:	Students to have computing skills sufficient to complete graduate coursework
Is taught by:	Experienced and Professionally Certified Palliative Care Chaplains
Is ideal for:	Chaplains working within or hoping to work in the field of palliative care or chaplains seeking to utilize palliative care best practices; other health care professionals wishing to expand their knowledge of spiritual care in a palliative care setting
Is open to:	All chaplains, religious leaders, or other health care professionals who address the spiritual and existential concerns of individuals and their loved ones
Provides:	Palliative care knowledge and skills for those practicing in professional chaplaincy and other health care fields

Participants will benefit from:

• A comprehensive understanding of the role of the chaplain on the palliative care team; the scope and practice of palliative care chaplaincy
• Knowledge of how spiritual assessment integrates and supports the plan of care, as well as the strengths and limitations of various spiritual assessment tools
• The ability to describe and employ spiritual care interventions and outcomes
• Skills to communicate palliative care and end-of-life care options to patients and their loved ones and facilitate decision-making in ways that help people make informed care decisions for themselves or their loved ones
• The ability to employ interventions for particular spiritual and existential pain symptoms, as well as complex grief, emotional distress, complex ethical and/or medical decision-making, family systems crises and other spiritual issues faced by patients and their loved ones
• Knowledge to teach and model moral resilience to clinicians, the interdisciplinary team, and the organization
• Cutting edge research and perspectives on chaplains as leaders, who contribute beyond their own team through participation on ethics committees, ethics consultation services, and engagement with organizational change and loss
• Cutting edge research in the fields of palliative care and palliative care chaplaincy.
• Interactions with expert chaplaincy faculty as well as fellow students from across the country
• 24/7 access to course content

Course Information

Additional Information

This 8-week online course is comprised of eight individual modules developed by experts in palliative care chaplaincy. Professionally certified chaplains who are experienced and practice in hospice and palliative care will teach the program.

Topics covered:

• Spiritual Care as Meaning-Making
• Engaging Positive & Negative Religious & Spiritual Coping
• Medical Decision-Making and Advance Directives
• Care of Groups and Family Systems
• Addressing Spiritual and Existential Suffering
• Palliative Care Chaplain as an Inspirational Leader, Educator and Advocate
• Professional Competencies for Palliative Care Chaplaincy
• Spiritual Care Assessment, Care Plan, Interventions and Outcomes
• Grief, Emotional Distress and Mental Health
• Supporting Patient Goals and Quality of Life
• Spiritual and Existential Pain, Physical Pain and Stress Management
• Palliative Care Chaplains as Facilitators of Resilience and Burnout Prevention
• Moral Resilience as a response to Moral Distress
• Palliative Care Chaplaincy Research, Ethics and Consultation
• Cultural Humility and Radical Respect for Cultural and Religious Differences

Course work includes activities designed to enhance learning through question/answer sessions, interactive case studies, engaged small group cohort sharing, journaling exercises, opportunities for students to apply knowledge in virtual palliative care contexts, and the ability to interact with the other participants and the instructor in an online community. Participants will be expected to complete one module each week, with the entire program taking a total of eight weeks.

The program is asynchronous, which allows participants to complete the course work on their own time with assignments due at the end of each week. Students can expect to spend eight to ten hours a week on the reading and assignments for the course.

All participants who proficiently complete the course work will receive a certificate of completion from the CSU Institute for Palliative Care.

Prerequisites

The program of study is designed to benefit professional chaplains as well as religious leaders and other health care professionals who address the spiritual and existential concerns of individuals and their loved ones.

If you are new to online technology, do not let that keep you from enrolling in this course! At the CSU Institute for Palliative Care we have a variety of ways to support you in making your online learning experience successful. Please reach out to the Institute with any questions or concerns.

Course Information