Evaluation of the LIGHT Curriculum: An African American Church-Based Curriculum for Training Lay Health Workers to Support Advance Care Planning, End-of-Life Decision Making, and Care.

Lay health workers (LHWs) engaging African Americans in conversations about advance care planning (ACP) often have felt unprepared for the challenges of communicating with patients as they approach the end of life. We developed a church-based training curriculum, LIGHT (Listening, Identifying, Guiding, Helping, Translating), in response to this need. To evaluate the LIGHT Curriculum by assessing its impact on knowledge, beliefs and attitudes, and self-efficacy of the learners; describing their assessment of the classroom component of the training; and describing their visit activities, and perceptions derived during client visits.

LIGHT: A Church-Based Curriculum for Training African American Lay Health Workers to Support Advance Care Planning and End-of-Life Decision-Making.

African Americans with life-limiting illnesses experience significant health inequities. Lay health workers (LHWs) may help overcome existing challenges of communicating with African Americans about advance care planning (ACP) and end-of-life decision-making. Church-based LHWs have some advantages over other LHWs but no curriculum exists to fully prepare them.

Faith Beliefs of African American Church Leaders Are Aligned With the Principles of Palliative and Hospice Care: A Community-Based Assessment and Intervention.

Background: African American (AA) church leaders often advise AAs with serious and life-limiting illnesses (LLIs).

Objectives: 1) determine beliefs of AA church leaders about palliative care and hospice care (PCHC), 2) assess association of participants' attitude about encouraging a loved one to learn about PCHC with whether PC or HC is consistent with faith beliefs and can reduce suffering and bring comfort, and 3) evaluate an interactive, educational intervention.

Design: prospective, one group, pre and post assessment of beliefs and attitudes Settings/Subjects: 100 church leaders from 3 AA Churches and one AA Church Consortium.

Engaging the African American Church to Improve Communication About Palliative Care and Hospice: Lessons From a Multilevel Approach.

Background: As the spiritual family for many African Americans, the church presents an opportunity to improve communication about palliative care and hospice (PCH). However, sustainable change in church-based, practices related to PCH requires a compreshensive, multilevel approach.

Objectives: Our primary goal was to encourage churches to embrace palliative care and hospice as acceptable alternatives for end-of-life care by creating venues to improve communications about PCH.

Evaluation of interprofessional health care team communication simulation in geriatric palliative care.

An interprofessional education (IPE) simulation-based geriatric palliative care training was developed to educate health professions students in team communication. In health care, interprofessional communication is critical to team collaboration and patient and family caregiver outcomes. Studies suggest that acquiring skills to work on health care teams and communicate with team members should occur during the early stage of professional education.

The Impact of Faith Beliefs on Perceptions of End-of-Life Care and Decision Making among African American Church Members.

Background: African Americans underuse palliative care and hospice services because of a combination of factors including faith beliefs. As the spiritual family for many African Americans, the church presents an opportunity to improve communication about palliative care and hospice and end-of-life (EOL) decision making.

Objectives: We conducted a focus group study to understand the cultural and spiritual perspectives that influence decisions about palliative care and hospice among African American church members who visit and support persons with life-limiting illnesses.

Translating community-specified indicators of program success into measurable outcomes.

Background: Community participatory research encourages community involvement in early stages of program development and implementation, but sustainability is dependent on continued community interest and participation. While locally measured outcomes may not be generalizable, evaluations that demonstrate progress on community-specified markers of success can demonstrate a community's return on investment. The purpose of this study was to outline a process whereby community-identified indicators of successful violence prevention were translated into measurable variables.

Building community participatory research coalitions from the ground up: the Philadelphia area research community coalition.

Background: A coalition of formal, large organizations and informal, grassroots organizations, recruited through an open process, contrasts with the usual practice of developing a community-based participatory research (CBPR) coalition with a small number of well-developed organizations.

Objectives: This paper describes the process, developmental challenges, and accomplishments of the Philadelphia Area Research Community Coalition (PARCC).

Methods: The University of Pennsylvania-Cheyney University of Pennsylvania EXPORT Center established the PARCC, an academic-community research partnership of twenty-two diverse organizations of variable size and with variable experience in health research.