PROGNOSIS: notes on living

Nancy Otto is Debra Chasnoff’s widow and is featured in PROGNOSIS. She consulted on the final stages of Chasnoff’s films and on the administration of her company Groundspark. Nancy is also a senior consultant at Klein & Roth Consulting, working exclusively with nonprofit organizations to build and strengthen their individual donor programs. Nancy was the video editor for WTVD News, an ABC affiliate, in Durham, North Carolina when it was the 35th largest media market in the country.

Kate Stilley Steiner is a documentary filmmaking producer, director, and editor. She also is a co-founder and co-director of Citizen Film, the documentary nonprofit media organization she started in 2001 with Sam Ball and Sophie Constantinou. Her most recent producing credits include American Creed, a CPB-funded feature-length documentary that premiered in 2018 in the PBS prime time core schedule and was one of 2018’s most widely carried documentaries. As Debra Chasnoff’s longtime collaborator, Kate edited several films with her, including two in the Respect for All series. They also co-produced several titles together, including Let’s Get Real, It’s Still Elementary, and One Wedding and a Revolution. An editor for 20 years, her credits include feature-length documentaries such as Wired for What (PBS), End of a Legend (TLC), and Throwing Curves (MOMA/NY). Additional editorial work includes The Story of Mothers and Daughters (ABC), the Emmy-winning Loyalty and Betrayal: The Story of the American Mob (Fox), and Academy Award-nominated Freedom on My Mind.

Sherrill Wayland is the Director of Special Initiatives at SAGE, directing the National Resource Center on LGBT Aging (NRC), supporting other initiatives such as the SAGE/HRC Foundation Long-term Care Equality Index, SAGECare training and credentialing program and the Diverse Elders Coalition.  Sherrill began work with SAGE at the local level in 2008, founding the SAGE Affiliate in St. Louis, joining SAGE national in 2015. Sherrill is a 2008 graduate from the Brown School, Washington University in St. Louis and has over 25 years of professional experience in the fields of education, disability and LGBT older adult advocacy.

Kris Kington-Barker is director of outreach & care provider programs and an educator for INELDA. She previously was the executive director for Hospice of San Luis Obispo County for 10 years. Prior to her focus on end-of-life care, Kris’s career ranged from psychiatric nursing to hospital and rural health clinic administration and operations. She currently serves on the board of directors for Joshua’s House Volunteer Hospice, dedicated to serving terminally ill persons who are experiencing homelessness, and is assisting in establishing end-of-life doulas as core members of their care team. Kris has been advocating the services and benefits that end-of-life doulas can bring to the dying, care givers, and end of life care teams since 2015. In 2022 she became a member of the NHPCO End of Life Doula Advisory Council. Kris continues to provide death doula services to her community as an independent doula, hospice volunteer, and participant in the EOLD Grief Support Program through NHPCO.

Lara Stewart-Panko works as a registered social worker and family educator residing in Ontario, Canada. For over two decades, Lara has worked as a full-spectrum birth and postpartum doula. Those experiences with pregnancy, birth, and early family life, as well as their time providing counseling and psychotherapy, led to training with INELDA, and recently began as an educator for the organization.

Doug Simpson is a trained INELDA End-of-life Doula and Chief Executive Officer for the organization. In 2018 he took the INELDA Doula Training and knew that he was on the right heart path. To get more involved in end-of-life work he started volunteering for INELDA in 2019. Doug immediately knew that in addition to working with dying people directly, he could contribute to the organization’s growth and future development, and began his role as CEO in 2022.