11th Congress of the European Association for Palliative Care, Vienna, 7th-10th May 2009

As a researcher who recently joined the WHO project on better practice palliative care for older people, the 11th congress of the EAPC 2009 was my first encounter with the vast human effort that flows into improving patient care for those vulnerable members of our society who are dying and for their families. It was heart-warming experience to meet so many people with professional and personal interest in palliative care: for children, for the frail elderly, for all who need special support, care and understanding when they face a most difficult time at the end of their lives.

The event presented a wonderful opportunity for our team at King's College London to discuss our work on a new WHO booklet for better practice palliative care for older people. We aim to raise awareness of the unmet needs of older people by offering examples of good palliative care. Helping policy makers to plan and support care-orientated services is a key element of our project, as is the intention to facilitate transfer of promising end-of-life care between different countries and health care systems in Europe. A poster presentation on the project at the EAPC central booth lasted during the entire event. This meant that we were able to present the research to a wide audience including medical doctors, nurses, academic researchers, social workers, health policy makers and others.

The presence of delegates from over 80 countries around the globe was a fascinating part of the programme. We exchanged ideas with professionals from countries who pioneered palliative care, such as the UK, Canada, Australia, the US. Conversations with reprsentatives from Bulgaria, Romania, Turkey, Croatia about new possibilities in palliative care and latest achievements were equally interesting.

A wide range of specialists expressed interest in our work and more specifically in the development of better palliative care for older people. We gathered a large number of contact details and increased our network for potential collaboration and academic exchange.

Dr. Hristina Petkova
Research Assistant
WHO Project on Better Practice Palliative Care
King's College London
Department of Palliative Care, Policy & Rehabilitation
Weston Education Centre
Cutcombe Road
London SE5 9RJ

Report of European Association of Palliative Care (EAPC) Conference Vienna 7-10th May 2009 to the IOELC School Travel Fund

Background

This was my first time attending an EAPC conference and it was a very stimulating experience.
I am a Research Associate responsible for the day to day management of an independent formative evaluation funded by Help the Hospices. The evaluation focuses on family carer interventions provided by hospices and other support agencies and has two trajectories: firstly, examining the providers of these services’ experiences of developing and delivering interventions to family carers of those with terminal illness; and secondly, evaluating the experiences of the carers as service recipients. Therefore my primary focus at the conference was on the family carers’ stream.

Conference presentations

There were four presentations in this stream over the two and a half days, and I attended them all. The presentations were delivered in a coherent and professional manner. I was struck most profoundly by the fact that all four presentations concentrated on caring as a burden, which as an approach has a long history in psychology and the social sciences. My work on the evaluation illustrates a far more diverse range of carer perspectives, and I came to the conclusion that much of the conference speakers’ findings on caring as a burden were linked to the recruitment methods of each of the studies represented in the presentations. Since most had recruited the study participants in focus groups or interviews with carers who were struggling, their data and conclusions would inevitably reflect the perspective of this singular type of carer that they attracted through their recruitment methods.

Poster exhibition & networking

The EAPC conference is renowned for its extensive and diverse poster exhibition, and this year was no exception. Over 800 posters were on display and all reported on various aspects of palliative care. I had two posters displayed from our evaluation, and both attracted interest from other delegates. I met some interesting people during the poster sessions; including a lecturer in palliative care from Melbourne Australia, and another delegate from London. We exchanged information on our various experiences in the field of Palliative Care. The International Observatory on End of Life Care seemed to be well known and enjoy a good reputation with many delegates that I talked to, and several commented on the large number of professional posters that we displayed in the exhibition. I exchanged email addresses with a delegate from a London hospice who shares a similar interest to me in migrant nurses and cultural differences in end of life care issues; we hope to be able to work together on a project in the future.

Socialising

In addition to the formal conference attendance I enjoyed the opportunity to catch up socially with my colleagues, many of whom I do not see very often because they work in other locations, or simply because in our run of the mill of daily work patterns we do not socialise much. It was very pleasant to share food, and go to a concert with work friends and spend some time getting to know more about them.

Conclusion

Overall attending the conference was a very worthwhile and enjoyable experience for me that I hope to capitalise on in the future. Many thanks for funding this trip.

Terri O’Brien
Research Associate
International Observatory on End of Life Care
Division of Health Research

It was a great honour for me to be funded by the School of Health and Medicine (SHM)
to attend to the Congress of the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) held in Vienna this year. I benefited tremendously from participating in one of the most important and influential meetings in palliative care, which helped broaden my horizon and set up successful networking. Most importantly I have learned a new world of knowledge in palliative care field. Among the many important and valuable programmes provided by the Congress I will just highlight a few that I found particular helpful to my research.

First of all, I acquired knowledge in the field of Palliative Care from a macro level. For example, the plenary ‘Who is a palliative care patient?’ raised a fundamental question of how to define palliative care population group. It struck me that the definitions of palliative care population are not always clear or consistent internationally. On the other hand being able to define the patient population is crucial as it is one of the critical steps when determine whether the findings from clinical studies can be generalised and applied in the evidence based practice in Palliative Care. This plenary gave me some insight into how to set up domains that are candidates for an international patient classification system and that may contribute to improve EBG in palliative care.

Apart from ‘macro-level’ plenary, other symposiums also offered me a lot of up-to-date knowledge. One particularly example is a symposium called ‘Culture and End of Life Care’, which explored the development of collaboration on culture and end of life care in Europe. This symposium consisted of topic of ‘Culture competency’ in End of Life practice, spirituality and religion in expression of pain and the like. These topics are relevant and useful to my project which is to evaluate an advanced care plan tool ‘Preferred Priorities for Care’ (PPC). One of the elements we would like to find out from the project is whether cultural factors impact the use of PPC. Being equipped with the up-to-date knowledge in this area will definitely benefit my research activities at the SHM. Another symposium that I found particularly helpful was the ‘Non-Cancer in Palliative Care’; especially the presentation on prognosis in advanced COPD - findings from a qualitative study with medical and nursing staff in the UK. The issue of offering advance care plan (e.g., PPC) to COPD patients rise frequently from my project meetings with health care staff. They complained about not knowing when to offer such a plan to patients with advanced COPD as a result of not knowing how to make a right prognosis for COPD. This presentation also concluded that open communication regarding prognosis is not routine in either primary or secondary care despite the poor prognosis associated with COPD and the shortcomings in education perceived by patients. I, thus, learned that difficulty in making COPD prognosis can be one of the factors that deter patients to have an advanced care plan.

Apart from knowledge, I also benefit from networking with people working in the same area. This Congress involves more than 3,000 people who are actively working in the field of Palliative Care. Although focused on Europe, the Congress included delegates who came from all over the world such as United States, Australia, and New Zealand. I met and networked with a group of experts from China presenting their work on setting up the first palliative care division in a Chinese cancer hospital, and their investigation of the meaning of palliative care among Chinese cancer patients. I think this net working provides an excellent opportunity for future collaboration. For example, it is possible that we may be able to have more participants from developing countries like China to the Observatory’s well-known Summer School Course on End of Life Care. With the expertise in the Observatory, it is also likely that we can collaborate with health care staff in countries which are developing their Palliative Care practice.

In summary, attending the EAPC congress provided me with new and relevant knowledge to my research at the SHM, and excellent networking opportunities. I am very grateful to be able to participate in such an important congress.

Dr. Xu Wang
Research Associate
International Observatory on End of Life Care
Division of Health Research

from Volume 10, No 6, June 2009 of the IAHPC newsletter at www.hospicecare.com/news/09/06/chair.html

From May 7-10th, we participated in the 11th Congress of the EAPC in two activities:

Although this Congress was started as a regional palliative care association (Europe), it has become, due to the diversity of participants, a worldwide event. It was exciting to see participants from all regions of the world, especially from developing countries. This was the largest Congress of the EAPC with regards to the number of participants, sessions and posters received. Congratulations to the EAPC for putting together a successful meeting and for its continuing efforts to develop palliative care in Europe and around the world.

These are exciting times for palliative care because there has been a tremendous increase in interest in international issues. However, this interest does not always result in a truly global agenda but rather a fractured and regionalized effort. In order to remain operationally simple and cost effective, we will continue, with our limited funds, to collaborate and communicate with organizations, NGOs and institutions from around the world that also wish to help in this field. We hope that our new projects will provide additional ways to network and collaborate with the global palliative care community.

from issue 57, June 2009 of the Worldwide Hospice and Palliative Care Online at www.helpthehospices.org.uk/enewsletter/WHPCO_Issue_57.htm

Congratulations to the European Association for Palliative Care (EAPC) on a successful and enjoyable congress held in Vienna on 7–10 May 2009. For four days, Vienna was the international centre of palliative care as about 3,000 delegates from more than 80 countries debated latest research initiatives and ways of better supporting patients and families affected by terminal illness. At the opening ceremony on Thursday evening, the Queen of Sweden set the tone for the congress speaking with great sincerity about her personal experience of palliative care and the need to extend the care to people with dementia.

This was the largest ever EAPC congress and offered a full and diverse scientific programme with more than 900 posters on display. The winners of the Special poster award were:

Daniela Mosoiu; Brasov, Romania – Developing palliative care: a top down approach.

Rut J Kiman; El Palomar, Argentina – A situational diagnosis to analyse the reasons for referrals for consultation by a paediatric palliative care team.

Samy A Alsirafy; Cairo, Egypt – Symptom prevalence in cancer patients referred to the first specialist palliative care clinic in Egypt.

Dr Vilnis Sosar; Riga, Latvia, received the Special Poster Award for his participation in the EAPC Delphi survey.