The Schwartz Center announces inaugural Compassion in Action Healthcare Conference

BOSTON, Oct. 20, 2016 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare, a national leader in the movement to make compassion a vital element in every patient-caregiver interaction, announced that the inaugural Compassion in Action Healthcare Conference will be held on June 25-27, 2017 in Boston, Mass. This conference will bring together clinicians, patients and health system leaders who are committed to making compassion a priority in their organizations and communities. Through experiential learning and interactive sessions participants will gain the inspiration, tools and partnerships to create and sustain cultures of compassion. Attendees for this convening include those focused on organizational culture change ranging from clinical and administrative leadership, ethics committee members, patient-family advisors and external experts including consultants, coaches and policy organizations.

"Unprecedented changes to healthcare spanning electronic medical records to new payment and delivery models have put a tremendous strain on the well-being of our clinical workforce and the patient-caregiver relationship," said Andrew Shin, JD, MPH, senior director, policy and strategic partnerships at the Schwartz Center. "At this new convening, healthcare organizations will learn how to create cultures based on compassion and collaboration that ultimately improve patient experience, workforce well-being and the quality of care."

Using the Compassionate Collaborative Care Framework as the foundation, participants will share best practices in advancing and sustaining cultures of compassion. Educational sessions will highlight communication, interprofessional teamwork and interpersonal skills, in addition to leadership development and strategies that successfully engage patients and families.

Conference highlights include:

• Balancing Vision with the Bottom Line: Engage with high-profile CEOs who have prioritized compassion in their organizations and benefited from it, and discuss how institutional leaders can engage clinical staff, drive culture change, balance vision with the bottom line and how to measure success.
• Implementing a Culture of Safety: Work with internationally recognized patient safety leaders on new system approaches to create cultures of safety. Go in-depth with a large academic medical center that developed an initiative to measure and prevent emotional injury to their patients akin to physical harm.
• Keynotes and Conversations: Join Marc Lesser, MBA, the CEO of Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute, who helped develop one of the most popular employee training programs at Google about how emotional intelligence training can lead to improved teamwork and leadership performance.  Also hear from Stanford University physician, Lucy Kalanithi, MD, FACP, whose late husband, Dr. Paul Kalanithi, wrote the #1 New York Times bestselling memoir, "When Breath Becomes Air," on how healthcare professionals and family caregivers alike can harness the power of compassion to heal.

"Our understanding of the importance and impact of compassion among individuals, teams and leaders who influence organizational climate has increased significantly in just the past few years," said Beth Lown, MD, medical director of the Schwartz Center. "This new initiative will enable us to leverage advances in this knowledge into actionable strategies that can spur and sustain cultures of compassion across the healthcare system."

A limited number of full scholarships will be offered to students and trainees entering the healthcare workforce, including those enrolled in medical, nursing or other allied health professional schools. Through a partnership with Charlotte AHEC, this conference will be accredited for continuing education credits for healthcare providers. 

Registration is now open, with an early bird rate available to those who register prior to Feb. 1, 2017.  To learn more and register, please visit compassioninactionconference.org.

About the Inaugural Compassion in Action Healthcare Conference
The inaugural Compassion in Action Healthcare Conference will be held on June 25-27, 2017 in Boston, Mass. This course has been approved for AMA PRA Category 1 Credits™, Continuing Education Units (CEUs), and Contact Hours by Carolinas HealthCare System/Charlotte AHEC.

This conference will bring together clinicians, patients and health system leaders who are committed to making compassion a priority in their organizations and communities. Using the Compassionate Collaborative Care Framework as the foundation, participants will share best practices in advancing cultures of compassion, communication, interprofessional teamwork and interpersonal skills, and apply those techniques towards initiatives and strategies that achieve the quadruple aim of improving patient experience, population health and workforce well-being while lowering costs. Visit compassioninactionconference.org to learn more about the conference.

About the Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare
Established in 1995, the Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare, a leader in the movement to make compassion a vital element in every patient-caregiver interaction, was founded on the belief that greater compassion and more meaningful collaboration are fundamental to the kind of care clinicians want to deliver and patients want to receive.

The Schwartz Center is an independent, non-profit organization, with more than 425 healthcare members in the U.S. and Canada, supporting 200,000 healthcare professionals each year. In partnership with the Point of Care Foundation, more than 150 hospitals, hospices and other healthcare organizations conduct the innovative Schwartz Rounds™ program in the U.K., which unites caregivers from a range of disciplines to share experiences, learn from each other and focus on the human dimension of medicine. Schwartz Center members rely on programs, education and resources to support clinician well-being, enhance the quality of care, enable better outcomes and create a more positive and rewarding experience for all members of the care team, patients and their families. The Center's inaugural Annual Compassion in Action Healthcare Conference (compassioninactionconference.org) will bring together clinicians, patients and families, health system leadership and others to advance a common goal of delivering more compassionate, collaborative care.

To help patients and family members acknowledge caregivers who epitomize the qualities of compassionate care the Schwartz Center established the Honor Your Caregiver program. Through its National Compassionate Caregiver of the Year Award, the Center celebrates healthcare professionals who display extraordinary devotion and compassion in caring for patients and families.

Visit us at theschwartzcenter.org or follow us on Facebook or Twitter.

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SOURCE The Schwartz Center for Compassionate Healthcare

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