Director of Respecting Choices(R) delivers overview of nation's most effective advance care planning program

Dr. Bernard “Bud” Hammes, director of Medical Humanities and the nationally recognized Respecting Choices® program for Gundersen Health System in La Crosse, Wisconsin, spoke on advance care planning to more than 60 people, mostly those connected to healthcare professions, in Langhorne on January 21.

The program provided an overview of advance care planning (ACP) – a process that engages people through informed conversations to help them identify, record and communicate to family and medical professionals what their wishes are for end-of-life care should they be unable to speak for themselves to family and caregivers.

Dr. Hammes, who has been instrumental in developing the Respecting Choices model for Gundersen beginning with the pilot program over 25 years ago, stressed that this is a collaborative, community-wide initiative. It relies heavily on community education and partnerships with healthcare professionals, faith organizations, hospice and community groups.

“Ultimately, the topic is not death, but how people care for each other,” he said. Studies show that those families who know what kind of treatment and care their loved one wants to pursue should issues or situations arise are calmer and more accepting because they know “this is what Dad would have wanted.”

He says that statistics also show that in La Crosse, where community education has made advance care planning “popular,” 96 percent of those who died had an advance directive to guide caregivers – the highest percentage in the country – while only 30 percent of deaths nationwide could say the same.

Generally, the planning process results in creating a durable healthcare power of attorney that names an appropriate person to speak on the patient’s behalf on medical issues and care, and a living will (also called an advance directive), which records a patient’s decisions about future care and guides family and medical professionals. Both documents can be revised at any time, such as in response to changed circumstances, as long as the person remains competent.

Here in Bucks County
The morning and afternoon sessions last week also drew audience members into a discussion about ACP initiatives for Bucks County communities and what the challenges and benefits are for the community as a whole.

Participating were Terri Rivera, VP Mission and Community Health for St. Mary Medical Center; Betsy Payn, MSN, executive director, and Veronica Coyne, MD, medical director, for Looking Ahead Advance Healthcare Planning; and Carolyn Newsom, Esq, community ACP champion and estate planning attorney in Lower Bucks County. The program was arranged by Newsom and the St. Mary staff.

Payn and Coyne saw a need for advance healthcare planning in their long careers in elder care; they established Looking Ahead a year ago as a 501c3 nonprofit community benefit organization.

Payn trained in Respecting Choices and its “train the trainer” program in La Crosse in 2013 and has since brought on board a select team of certified counselors qualified to conduct the sensitive, confidential and customized conversations that are key to the Respecting Choices model.

LA is also guided by a board of directors made up of local business people and doctors. For more information on Looking Ahead Advance Healthcare Planning and its programs and services: 267.544.9580, Betsy@LookingAheadACP.org or LookingAheadACP.org.

The event was held at Middletown Country Club.

Image of Dr. Hammes, Credit: Gundersen Health System