Hospice group gets grant to raise public awareness
Campaign may show the way for other associations
The Hospice Federation of Massachusetts (HFM) has been awarded a $100,000 grant from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in Princeton, NJ, to test strategies and tools for raising public awareness about hospice care, reports HFM executive director Rigney Cunningham, MSW. (See related story, p. 42.)
The project builds on a series of 1996 Boston Globe articles profiling hospice care, as well as video footage produced by the cable New England News Network. HFM plans to distribute copies of these pieces as widely as possible. Other components of the project include a consumer’s guide to hospice, an information clearinghouse, an Internet home page, a statewide speaker’s bureau, television public service announcements, and a traveling exhibit of photographs from the Globe’s hospice articles.
The project will bring the hospice message directly to consumers, well before they might need it, so that they would know to ask their physicians about hospice care, Cunningham says. "Most hospices already have professional relations programs. Hospices in Massachusetts have tried to educate health professionals. That hasn’t worked. Length of stay is dropping in hospice; referrals are dropping off. There are too many incentives not to refer. So now we’re saying, let’s try informing the consumer, so the consumer can ask the doctor, Is hospice appropriate for me?’ That’s the gist of our whole campaign."
Cunningham also hopes the project can help "open the conversation about dying as a part of life. My experience with the [Globe] photo exhibit is that when people see it they are drawn to it, so it prompts conversations about end-of-life care the kinds of conversations we need to have." For those who know only a little about hospice, its close association with dying may make it seem depressing, Cunningham says. The challenge thus lies in finding ways to emphasize the benefits of hospice. "What can we lend to the hospice message that’s about hope and dignity, about not being a burden, about being comfortable at home?"
HFM’s grant is based on the good fortune of being lauded in the Globe profile. "But the whole goal of this plan is to develop tools that will be useful to individual hospices," Cunningham says. "What we don’t want to do is reinvent the wheel, or worse, invent flat tires that nobody can use." She recommends that other states also tackle public awareness, first by "looking at what you already have going for you, based on current resources. Be in touch with your members and with what they need."
CSHA examining outreach issues
The California State Hospice Association (CSHA) is also looking at public outreach. CSHA executive director Margaret Clausen met in late February with representatives from the national public relations firm Hill & Knowlton, which has offered pro bono assistance in planning a statewide campaign to educate consumers about hospice. CSHA’s board of directors committed itself to such a campaign at its March 11 meeting.
In explaining the plan at the association’s annual meeting in Universal City on March 14, CSHA president Jeanne Dennis, MSW, ACSW, said it involved developing, with the consultants’ assistance, "a simple, concise, and clear message . . . that we will impart to consumers to explain what hospice does." The campaign would target two primary audiences, women between the ages of 35 and 50 and people over 65, since these are the groups most likely to face a hospice decision. The project also will develop public service announcements and a white paper which providers can use as a basis for presenting the hospice message to their communities.
CSHA also hopes to take advantage of the National Hospice Organization-sponsored traveling exhibit, "Hospice: A Photographic Inquiry," which will be at the San Diego Museum of Art June 7 to July 20. Although the exhibit and related materials were developed to maximize public exposure opportunities, CSHA is challenged to generate interest and participation from hospices across the vast state for an exhibit showing in just one corner of the state, Clausen says.
[For more information on the Massachusetts public awareness project, contact Rigney Cunningham at HFM, 1420 Providence Highway, Suite 277, Norwood, MA 02062. Telephone: (617) 255-7077.]
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