Advanced Pediatric Palliative Care Communication Training

Advanced Communication Skills for Pediatric Patient and Family Support

This 5.5 CE hour, self-paced online course delivers evidence-based strategies that address the most challenging facets of communication in pediatric palliative care, including facilitating decision making, sharing serious news, overcoming the “conspiracy of silence,” communicating with complex families, and negotiating conflict.

Why Take This Course?

Effective communication is a cornerstone of quality palliative care. Communicating effectively with children, teens, and young adults with serious illness, and their families requires specialized approaches attuned to the patient’s developmental age and stage, as well as other factors.

This online course provides a deeper understanding of what is different about communicating with young hospice and palliative care patients and their families vs. adult patients and teaches skills that open communication pathways to ensure young patients and their families are heard and supported.

This course can be taken on its own or as part of these comprehensive programs:

• Certificate in Clinical Pediatric Palliative Care – 66 CEs
• Multidisciplinary Certificate in Pediatric Palliative Care – 37.5 CEs

 Who Should Take This Course?

This course is ideal for RNs, NPs, APRNS, physicians, physician assistants, social workers, chaplains and other members of the hospice, palliative care, or home health team who care for pediatric patients with serious illness and their families, and/or want to specialize in pediatric palliative care. It builds on concepts explored in the Basic Communication Skills for Pediatric Patient and Family Support and the Foundational Communication Skills for Pediatric Patient and Family Support courses.

Course Information

Fast Facts

Begins:	Immediately upon registration
Is taught:	Completely online and is available 24/7
Offers:	5.5 Continuing Education Hours
Costs:	$79
Requires:	Computing skills sufficient to complete graduate work, access to a computer with an Internet connection
Is ideal for:	Is ideal for: Nurse Practitioners, APRNS, RNs, PAs, physicians, social workers, chaplains, child life specialists, therapists, and other members of the hospice, palliative care, or home health team who have some experience working with seriously ill pediatric patients and their families and/or want to specialize in pediatric palliative care
Cancellation Policy:	There are no refunds on our self-paced courses

Course Description

This course comprises five modules that cover topics central to communicating with young patients and their families, such as eliciting and clarifying goals and values to facilitate decision making, responding to families who  request withholding information from young patients, utilizing attentive listening to develop trust, and managing conflict.

Modules and topics include:

Decision Making

This module prepares learners to:

• Construct a genogram to reveal important family relationships and context
• Describe normal developmental stages of children and their understanding of death
• Use decision-making tools appropriate for children, teens, and young adults
• Employ creative communication strategies, tools, and resources

Sharing Serious News

By the end of this module, learners will be equipped to:

• Prepare for a first visit with a seriously ill child, teen, or young adult and their family
• Use appropriate methods of responding to difficult questions
• Apply the SPIKES model to conversations involving sharing serious news or confronting painful topics

Conspiracy of Silence

This module explores how to:

• Recognize when families are engaged in a “conspiracy of silence”
• Use developmentally appropriate modes of communication to talk with children, teens, and young adults
• Address needs of siblings
• Demonstrate effective responses to families who ask for information to be withheld from the pediatric patient.

Communicating with Complex, Challenging, and Complicated Families

This module addresses how to:

• Identify the differences that distinguish complex, challenging, and complicated families
• Utilize attentive listening to obtain information and establish trust
• Apply the SPIKES model to defuse conflict
• Develop a self-care plan to manage stress, and more

Managing Conflict

By the end of this module, learners will be prepared to:

• Recognize types and causes of conflict
• Control physical responses to conflict
• Constructively respond to conflict between various parties
• Utilize creative strategies to encourage open expression of feelings by children, teens, and young adults

STRATEGIC PARTNERS

The Institute’s Pediatric Palliative Care curriculum was developed by expert clinicians in pediatric palliative care from leading children’s hospitals and hospice programs, with support from:

• Children’s Hospice and Palliative Care Coalition/Coalition for Compassionate Care of California
• Providence TrinityCare Hospice and Trinity KidsCare

COURSE AUTHOR

Joan “Jody” Ramer Chrastek, RN, DNP, FPCN, PACCT (Pediatric Advanced Complex Care Team) coordinator for Fairview Home Care and Hospice, Minneapolis, MN

Course Information