Much progress has been made in palliative care education since publication of reports such as the Institute of Medicine's Approaching Death document, especially for medical residents and staff nurses. However, many health care professional students continue to have limited education and clinical experience related to palliative care. Additionally, they lack the preparation to collaborate with other disciplines to provide comprehensive palliative care. We propose to develop and implement a novel university-based, Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Education Program for graduate students in nursing, medicine, and other health-related disciplines. We are in a strong position to support development of the proposed program because a) our institution is firmly committed to this educational endeavor and b) we have a cadre of interdisciplinary faculty who have begun to develop research programs in palliative care and to integrate palliative care into the graduate curricula. An interdisciplinary advisory committee has been established to oversee the development, implementation, evaluation and dissemination of the Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Education Program. Over the five-year project period, we will a) develop and implement a novel Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Education Program that builds upon existing end-of-life and palliative care initiatives and incorporates interdisciplinary didactic coursework, case conferences, and clinical activities for graduate-level health care students;b) implement a comprehensive evaluation plan for the proposed Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Education Program;and c) sustain the Interdisciplinary Palliative Care Education Program within Rush University Medical Center and disseminate the education model to other academic medical centers by sharing our experiences and course and clinical materials. We anticipate that the proposed program will significantly enhance collaborations among our health care professional students and faculty and improve the quality of care for patients requiring palliative care for cancer and other life limiting illnesses. Given the large number of persons in need of palliative care, the need for this kind of educational program is tremendous. Providing health care professional students with the state-of-the art knowledge and skills in palliative care and experiences in interdisciplinary collaboration will offer patients a superior quality of palliative care.
