Discussing Advance Care Directives with Family
Recorded: October 2020
Members View HERE
Webinar Guest Speakers:
Gloria Thomas Anderson, PhD, LMSW – advance care planning expert, Founder of Heart Tones™ and author
Lauren Jodi Van Scoy, MD – is a pulmonary & critical care physician at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center
Webinar Moderator:
Kris Kington – Barker – INELDA
The holidays can be an opportune time for families and friends to engage in conversations about maintaining wellness, health changes, and healthcare preferences—whether you’re with them in person or virtually. Starting these conversations can be awkward and challenging. INELDA’s October webinar will focus on some available tools and approaches to introducing important considerations about healthcare values and choices to assist in a broader discussion regarding Advance Care Directives.
Gloria Thomas Anderson, PhD, LMSW is the founder and president of Heart Tones™, a literary arts ministry that provides customized, educational workshops, products, and resources related to emotional wellness, health care decision-making, end of life, and cultural competency. Dr. Thomas Anderson holds an interdisciplinary doctorate degree in curriculum and instruction and educational leadership, policy, and foundations, and a master’s degree in social work. She is currently a university-level professor of social work. Dr. Thomas Anderson’s research focuses on cultural responsiveness in urban-based social work, health care equity at end of life, and spirituality in the workplace. She is the author of The African-American Spiritual and Ethical Guide to End-of-Life Care: What Y’all Gon’ Do With Me?, a culturally-sensitive book for people of color as a helpful resource to navigate health care decision-making options.
Dr. Thomas Anderson has over 14 years of experience working with hospices, health care, and non-profit organizations in advance care planning education outreach efforts to communities of color. She is the 2020 recipient of the Capital Caring Health “Passion for Caring Social Justice Hero” Award, in honor of her service commitment and end-of-life work within the African American community. She remains an active member of the AA-ACP Network, and recently participated in multiple pandemic-related webinars through the Center for Practical Bioethics’ COVID Ethics Update series. She spoke about factors contributing to the disproportionate number of Black people dying from COVID-19 and other relevant issues within the African American population. Dr. Thomas Anderson is a member of the Social Work Hospice and Palliative Care Network and actively serves on the Interfaith and Diversity Workgroup for the Coalition to Transform Advance Care (C-TAC).
Lauren Jodi Van Scoy, MD, Associate Professor of Medicine, Humanities and Public Health Sciences and Co-Director, Qualitative and Mixed Methods Core at Penn State University.
Dr. Van Scoy’s current and ongoing research activities use qualitative and mixed methodology to evaluate innovative communication tools in variety of areas, including advance care planning and engaging patients and their families in discussions about end-of-life issues. She has expertise in mixed methods and qualitative research and is the co-founder and co-director of Penn State Clinical and Translational Science Institute’s Qualitative and Mixed Methods Core, along with Dr. Heather Stuckey, MEd, DEd.
Dr. Van Scoy’s research has been funded by the National Institute of Health, including projects related to the rigorous assessment of communication quality using a methodology she co-developed with collaborator Allison Scott, PhD (University of Kentucky).
She is the director of Project Talk, a research program that studies the impact of innovative conversational tools, including an end-of-life conversation game (“Hello”) and an novel graphic ICU communication tool (Let’s Talk).
Most recently, she partnered with the Hospice Foundation of America to lead a national community-engagement project to evaluate and disseminate the “Hello” across 27 states and more than 1,200 people living in underserved communities.
Dr. Lauren Van Scoy is a pulmonary and critical care physician at Penn State Health Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. She has a clinical interest in acute respiratory distress syndrome, septic shock, clinical ethics, communication and end-of-life decision-making.
This webinar is for INELDA members. Not a member? Learn more
