I write about Palliative Care, I write about Policy, I write about Palliative Care Policy. Now I like to write & teach about how to engage in the Political Process to improve Palliative Care Policy
(and some award stuff when you scroll down)
Social Justice and Palliative Care Policy - Policy blog post that raises the question: What role do we (as HAPC workers) play in maintaining a hospice and palliative care system of structural inequity that favors and maintains a norm of whiteness and socioeconomic stability? (July 18, 2020)
LIVE CE Webinar | Political Palliative Care Practice: Social Work with Power - Workshop webinar I conducted for SWHPN with Dr Shannon Lane on engagement in palliative care political social work, and seeking opportunities for effective political action. Through this workshop, social workers and social work students learned how to organize and advocate for social change to address significant gaps in palliative care access and treatment. (January 29. 2021)
Recent legislation includes hospice and palliative care social work as part of interdisciplinary survey team - Policy blog post from my time on the Hospice Strike team, contributing to a response to CMS related to: HOSPICE Act H.R. 5821. Good opportunity to increase the voices of social work, and the values of our profession in hospice quality reporting measures. Maybe someday, adequately addressing social determinants of health needs will be as important as the physical needs of patients. But social work is making progress and are now potentially surveyors on this team. (Feb 5, 2021)
Attention Hospice and Palliative Care Social Workers: There is a need for your voice! Blog post I did with Jennifer Hirsch, LMSW, APHSW-C and doc student from University of Michigan on the Social Determinants of Health Caucus and the call for comments & feedback. We have to remember that HAPC patients should NEVER be left out of the conversation related to Social Determinants of Health and social determinants that contribute to higher amounts of suffering, pain, or worse outcomes for our patients are an immediate social justice concern. (Sept 10, 2021)
Political Palliative Care: Opportunities for Advocacy to Transform Palliative Care Policy blog post I did for SWHPN and my first use of the term Political Palliative Care in a blog post (ok, I've used it before, but not in a blog post!). Discussion of ways busy practitioners can engage in political advocacy on federal and state level. Support for Community Based Palliative Care Act and the Palliative Care GPS that me & my students helped the Solomon Center at Yale Law School do research for (October 8, 2021).
As a representative of SWHPN, I worked on a team including the 13 major HAPC organizations that make up the Coalition. We were tasked with responding to proposed changes to the Medicare Hospice Program, that mainly focused on the Hospice Quality Reporting Program requirements as well as the FY 2022 Hospice Wage Payment Rates and Hospice Conditions of Participation.
For the section I wrote, turn to pages 16-18. I authored the response to: Requests for Information- CMS is seeking comment on the possibility of expanding measure development and adding aspects of SPADEs that could apply to hospice and address gaps in health equity in the HQRP. (June 7, 2021)
CMS actually responded to some of my suggestions here:
86 FR 42600
Authored Equity & Inclusion sections & Social Determinants of Health sections for the National Coalition for Hospice and Palliative Care's requested comments and recommendations to the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services (CMS). As a response to CMS-1773-P Medicare Program; FY 2023 Hospice Wage Index and Payment Rate Update and Hospice Quality Reporting Requirements
For the sections I helped to author, turn to page 8-14, the Equity section, including helping to define health inequity as:
"health differences which are systemic, unnecessary and avoidable, while also considered unfair and unjust"
Additionally pages 14-16 provides recommends for the development of a new composite measure for health equity, including my suggestions for improving existing data collection by hospices on SDOH: "Current structural composite measure do not adequately address social determinants of health, which must be considered as the focus on health equity increases" (submitted 5/31/22).
Limiting hospital visitations during COVID not in patients’ best interests Op-Ed published in the CT Mirror.
Op-Ed written with Shannon Lane & Kerry Milner, urging health care systems to improve visitation practices in hospitals. Inconsisent visitor restrictions are implemented in local hospitals with neither justification nor transparency about decision making process. COVID-19 community transmission rates are high, and health care systems in our areas and across the country are responding with policies designed to protect health care workers and patients by removing (in some cases) all visitation privileges in hospitals, Discussion of sacrificing patient and family centered care in the process of this policy. The current trend of “no visitor” policies in health care settings is bad for the well-being of patients, health care workers, and patients’ family members. Rather than limit hospital visitation, we believe hospitals should facilitate safe visitation.
Interviewed and quoted in the Greenwich times 3/29/2021
Suzanne Marmo, a professor of social work at Sacred Heart University, said the ag project is valuable because it is a public symbol that gives people “permission to grieve.”
“We haven’t really started grieving this circumstance,” Marmo said of the COVID-19 pandemic. “I believe that as a society collectively we’ve been stuck in our grief. Our losses have been hidden away in hospitals. We haven’t been able to see our loved ones. We haven’t been able to grieve them and start our bereavement process in a way that’s comfortable to us.”
This is a chance to share the grief from the past year as a community, which she said is necessary.
Social Justice and Advanced Cancer Patients: an Analysis of Key Policies Suzanne Marmo & Shannon R. Lane This policy analysis examines key aspects of two policies fundamental to work with terminal cancer patients: the Medicare Hospice Benefit and Medicare policy in palliative care. Using Gilbert and Terrell’s framework, social allocations, social provisions, service delivery, and financing are examined to better understand each policy’s effects on equality, equity, and adequacy for terminally ill cancer patients.
Open access article published in 2020 in Journal of Policy Practice and Research (2020) 1:37–54 https://doi.org/10.1007/s42972-020-00003-0
Sometimes I stand in front of the chapel and get new faculty headshots.
#SHUSW #SWHPN #PoliticalPalliativeCare
Sometimes I get a faculty award for best research article
Thats right, thats me & Dr P
Sometimes, I get awards for my research from the journals in which they were published
Social Justice, Organizational Commitment and Job Satisfaction for Palliative Care Social Workers-
Mary Parker Follett Award 2021
This award is an annual journal award that recognizes an outstanding research article that is informed by theory and contributes to theory development. Mary Parker Follett was a settlement house social worker and management theorist who gained international recognition in the 1920's for her contributions to management theory in the human services.
Social Workers’ Perceptions of Job Satisfaction, Interdisciplinary Collaboration, and Organizational
Leadership -Journal of Social Work in End-of-Life & Palliative Care - Editor's Choice-2018
