Integrating Surgical Palliative Care Into the Full Spectrum of Medical Education.

We describe our institutional approach to incorporating surgical palliative care education into the Undergraduate Medical Education, Graduate Medical Education and Continuing Medical Education spaces as a model to help guide similarly interested educators. We had a well-established Ethics and Professionalism Curriculum, but an educational needs assessment revealed that both the residents and faculty felt that additional training in palliative care principles was crucial. We describe our full spectrum palliative care curriculum, which begins with the medical students on their surgical clerkship and continues with a 4 week surgical palliative care rotation for categorical general surgery PGY-1 residents, as well as a Mastering Tough Conversations course over several months at the end of the first year.

How I Do It a Surgical Palliative Care Rotation for Residents.

To address the need for increased exposure to the essential components of Palliative Care in our residency, we created a 4 week rotation in Surgical Palliative Care for all of our categorical interns. The rotation includes time on an interdisciplinary inpatient consultative palliative care service as well as time in the outpatient clinic and in the operating room with the Surgical Palliative Care attending. Most patients who are seen and evaluated have surgical issues, allowing exposure to the fundamental aspects of palliative care as they pertain to surgical practice across the continuum of healthcare settings.

Mitigating Burnout.

Burnout is characterized by emotional exhaustion, depersonalization, and a reduced sense of personal accomplishment. All physicians, and especially surgeons, are at risk for developing burnout. The best strategies for mitigating burnout mimic a modern approach to medicine: the development of preventive practices to protect, promote, and maintain health and well-being.

Surgical palliative care training in general surgery residency: An educational needs assessment.

Introduction: There is increasing recognition that Surgical Palliative Care is an essential component of the holistic care of surgical patients and involves more than end-of-life care in the intensive care unit. General surgery residents are clinically exposed to patients with palliative care needs during each year of training, but few have a dedicated surgical palliative care curriculum. We undertook this educational needs assessment as the first step towards a longitudinal curriculum.