Counseling Patients and Families on Forgoing Life Prolonging Therapy
Member Exclusive | Hospice Foundation of America Webinar
Hospice Foundation of America webinar
Event Details
SDAHO members receive free or discounted rates on HFA educational sessions. Register through SDAHO to receive a coupon code to use on HFA's site to access the special rates.
Overview:
Hospice and palliative care professionals specialize in counseling patients and families on continuing or forgoing life prolonging medical interventions, especially as those therapies become increasingly burdensome and impair quality of life, making hospice a reasonable alternative. While these conversations are often considered “difficult,” they are critical to providing patients and families education and support that empower them to choose care that aligns with their wishes from an informed perspective.
Join Kate Sims, RN, MBA, and Joseph Sacco, MD, BFM, ACQ-HPM from The Connecticut Hospice, the first hospice program in the United States, as they highlight effective and empathetic communication strategies using real-word examples.
Target Audience: Hospice
Registration closes Aug 10 at Noon CT.
Kate Sims, RN, BS, MBA
Kate Sims is a senior healthcare executive with more than 40 years of progressive leadership experience across acute care hospitals, hospice, homecare, outpatient services, patient experience, and healthcare operations. She is recognized for driving transformational change, operational excellence, clinical quality, and strategic growth within complex healthcare systems.
Currently serving as Chief Operating Officer and Chief Compliance Officer at The Connecticut Hospice, the nation’s first hospice founded in 1974, Kate provides executive leadership across hospice, skilled home care, inpatient nursing, palliative care, and community-based programs. She oversees multidisciplinary teams, organizational quality initiatives, regulatory compliance, patient experience, and operational strategy across the continuum of care.
Throughout her career, Kate has successfully led large-scale operational improvements, accreditation readiness, quality and safety initiatives, patient experience transformations, and healthcare growth strategies. Her leadership has resulted in measurable improvements in patient satisfaction, operational efficiency, clinical outcomes, and financial performance.
Joseph Sacco, MD, BFM, ACQ-HPM
Joseph Sacco has been the Chief Medical Officer at Connecticut Hospice since 2016, and is a board-certified hospice and palliative medicine physician with over 40 years of experience. He oversees clinical and operational activities for its 53-bed Joint Commission-certified hospital and home care services for 225–250 patients, managing a team of physicians and APRNs across inpatient and homecare offices.
Previously, he founded and led the palliative medicine consultation and hospice inpatient service at Bronx Lebanon Hospital (2004–2016). Board-certified in Family Medicine (1986) and Hospice & Palliative Medicine (2007), he is an Associate Professor of Medicine at Yale School of Medicine. He has published in Health Affairs, AJHPM, and The New York Times, and authored three books. He lives in Madison, CT, with his wife, Colleen, and enjoys writing and wilderness backpacking with Colleen and their daughter, Rosie.